


High Castles and Low Places

by Summercat



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: 1940s, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Antisemitism, Bisexual Bucky Barnes, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Catholic Bucky Barnes, Dark, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, Female Jewish Character, Flashbacks, M/M, Memory Loss, Misogyny, Nazis, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Racism, Post-Captain America: The First Avenger, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Protective Bucky Barnes, Sassy Steve Rogers, Torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-11
Updated: 2016-09-06
Packaged: 2018-07-22 23:06:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 5
Words: 31,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7457305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Summercat/pseuds/Summercat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>“You don’t scare me,” she said defiantly, jutting her chin up. A pause. “None of you men scare me.”</em>
</p><p>-  </p><p>After his fall from the train, Bucky struggles to hold on to his old identity in the face of Hydra's manipulations and threats. Despite feeling abandoned by the Howling Commandos, Bucky is determined not to break his allegiance to Steve Rogers. He must fight to remain that charming soldier boy from Brooklyn, no matter the pain or provocation heaped upon him by his captors. However, as time goes by and the chance of rescue diminishes, Bucky begins to struggle to hold on to the memories of what life was like before his imprisonment and of who he really is. </p><p>Enter Susi, a Jewish resistance fighter caught up in the web of Hydra's games. Bucky must brave physical and psychological torture in order to keep her safe - not from the Hydra agents, but from himself. </p><p>-</p><p>[Please be aware that this fic features period-specific antisemitism. This is for narrative purposes and is not meant to offend.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Seeing Stars

 

“Stand up soldier!”

 

The hard clanging scrape of rusted metal filled the cell, followed at once by the hollow sound of jackboots on concrete. Bucky resisted the urge to moan out as he made to obey the command, staggering up from his cot.

 

“Look lively! We’ve brought you some company.”

 

Rising unsteadily, he clocked the ring of service revolvers levelled squarely at his chest and he let his hands drift away from his sides, ready to comply.   

 

“ _Oy gavalt!_ ”

 

Bucky’s head shot up in shock at the sound of the woman’s voice. He stared. What-

_She was very pretty._

 

The thought was involuntary, rearing up in him on some long forgotten instinct. Having been down here, alone, for he didn’t know how long, suffering in the dark and the damp with no one to talk to and no one to offer him comfort… It was only natural, really, that when the girl was first brought struggling into the cell all Bucky could logically think was pretty, _real pretty._

 

It was only for a split second, as he floundered through the initial shock at seeing something that wasn’t ugly or broken or _Hydra_ , that he let himself feel happy that she was there. In a light cotton dress the colour of an American summer sky, with waved hair and olive skin, petite when everything around her was large and looming. He bit his lower lip, sighing, the fingers of his real hand twitching to touch. _Jesus wept_.

 

When that blissful second had ticked over, however, Bucky let himself register the expression on her doll’s face, the way her large, brown eyes had strayed to the mess of metal and flesh at his shoulder, her whole body seeming to shake at the wrongness of it. He resolved right then and there to crush the thought down – _sweet thing_ – telling himself to ignore it. Yeah she was pretty, but she was also scared to all hell. A pretty, scared girl barely out of her teens, standing trembling in the basement cell of a Hydra base, soldiers flanking her with guns at their sides, her ma probably worrying herself to death, her pa probably out looking for her, wondering, praying that she was alright, both trying not to imagine some guy ogling up their child, thinking things he shouldn’t.

 

_Bucky wasn’t that guy._

 

That soldier boy, the gentleman, who still clung on defiantly at the edges of his fried brain flexed his muscles, stirring, reminding Bucky that not so long ago, if he’d been at a dance hall in Brooklyn and seen a girl wearing an expression like that he would have done something about it. Sometimes it was as easy as steering the girl away from an unwanted advance. He’d casually cut in, asking for a turn around the floor so as to put himself between her and some slobbering jackass that couldn’t take a hint. Other times it might be more difficult, like being forced to raise his fists in an alley, defending a dame’s honour or simply making a point. He’d show the world that there were decent men about who wouldn’t stand for grabby, animalistic nonsense. Bucky considered it a duty, the same way it was his duty to step in if Steve was getting his face smashed up – that stubborn, mulish bastard. It wasn’t that he thought girls couldn’t look out for themselves - he wasn’t some chivalric know it all - he just didn’t think they should have to, not if he could do it for them. How many girls had he walked home from diners or lindy hops, just because he wouldn’t have slept had he let them go alone?

 

“Well Susi, what do you think of our Howling Commando?”

 

Some German stiff drawling to the right of him, speaking to the girl, it was – well, Bucky never knew the names of his captors, they never offered anything as personal as _that._ It was enough that Bucky recognised him, the tallest, leanest, meanest Sonofabitch who always liked to push things so much further than the others. Bucky recognised the stun baton with the custom handle, strapped lovingly to the man’s hip. He was stroking it, rubbing his thumb against the holster. Bucky glared. That baton had been pressed hard into what must have been every muscle on Bucky’s body, lighting him up for hours until his very skeleton sang.

 

This man was the first Hydra agent Bucky had met in the base, after days of seeing only medics and technicians and all sorts of fellas in white coats holding pointed, silver instruments, all of them refusing to talk _to him_ , only to each other _about him_ , sticking him with needles and prodding him with gloved, impersonal fingers while he kept asking, where, where am I, why-

 

Bucky shook his head, jerking it roughly to the side and back, like he always did when he was slipping into blurriness, getting lost in some other time. These days it was always so much harder to remain in one place.

 

He didn’t always fight to pull himself out of the slide once it had started, because sometimes he was outside in the green, earthy wetness of a forest, lying under canvass beside his comrades, a free and virile member of the team. At others he was in the three-story walk up, sprawled lazily on his back smoking cigarettes in the New York heat, shirtsleeves rolled up and braces taken down, waiting for Steve to get outta the tub so he could sink into the cool, dirty water and wallow, stiff from his shift at the docks. Then, more often, he was in his ma’s embrace, pushing his face against the rough tog of her apron while she ruffled his hair, and he was so much smaller then, not even in long trousers…

 

These remembrances had begun to grow fainter and more infrequent with each passing day, while other, less pleasant things took their place, pushing them out to the fringes of his memory. Like when he was falling through the air, the sound of a train engine and his own blood roaring in his ears, plummeting into whiteness and not knowing if it was him screaming or if it was _Captain America_ he could hear crying out on the wind, begging for him to come back.  

 

The girl was saying something, her English accented but good.

 

“We were told, that is we heard-” Bucky watched her lips forming the words, liking the plushness of them, hating himself, “-he died.”

 

“You shouldn’t listen to every rumour you hear hissed about the ghetto. Such a gullible race.” A pause, Sonofabitch seeming amused. His men laughed. “I bet you think those trains actually _do_ carry potatoes.”

 

Jewish then. Fuck, _no_. The protective urge in Bucky rocketed, but he wouldn’t let it show on his face as he watched them, his eyes flicking between the shivering girl and the snivelling, grand-standing Nazi. Easy to be a big man when you’re picking on someone half your size and strength, when you’re bristling with weapons and you’ve got all your friends, standing close, talking cheap, holding guns.

 

Bucky hated unfair fights. 

 

“You are to stay here, _Leibchen_ ,” Sonofabitch’s smile was oily, as he stood altogether too close to the girl for Bucky’s liking and grasped her chin between forefinger and thumb. He stroked the indent beneath her bottom lip, as though thoughtful. He glanced at Bucky, conveying a meaning he’d have to be a halfwit to miss. “I’m sure Sergeant Barnes will take care of you.”

 

-

 

Once they’d left, Susi didn’t speak for almost two hours. Bucky knew because he’d been counting the minutes off in his head, waiting. And when she did speak, finally, he really wished she hadn’t.

 

“You’re supposed to take me.”

 

Her voice didn’t falter, but looking at her from across the cell he could see the rigidity of her back against the wall, the watchfulness in her eyes. The yellow star on her shoulder stuck out in the dank and the gloom, and he wondered dimly why he hadn’t noticed it earlier. Bucky sighed.

 

“I know,” he responded. “Doesn’t mean I’m gonna.”    

 

Susi blinked at him, the wariness far from receding.

 

“Then what will you do?”

 

That accent, he shouldn’t have found it alluring, but he did. It was exotic because it wasn’t American, and it was so very welcome because it wasn’t German. He didn’t know where in the world he was, so he figured he’d narrow it down to where he’d been with the Howlies when he fell – Poland? Poland had ghettos, hell, where in the occupied zone didn’t have ghettos…

 

“Please tell me,” Susi murmured, breathless with nerves. Her chest heaved, and he closed his eyes against it. He brought his head back hard against the wall of the cell, _thwack_. Her ma was somewhere right now, crying, thinking her daughter was in a situation exactly like this. Would she rather Susi were dead?   

 

Bucky thought about that awhile. He looked down at himself, sniffed, put his real hand up to the bridge of his nose and pinched it like he was trying to stop a nosebleed. The cell already smelled different with her in it. Her musk wasn’t overpowering exactly, it was just that for a while he’d gotten used to the stink of men and boot leather. He’d nearly – _almost –_ forgotten women had a scent all their own. It was reflexive, the full body shiver her odour set off in him. He rolled his shoulders, the muscles rippling in his back, and the metal plates of the _thing_ whirred a little at his side.

 

He resolved not to respond to her at all, because Bucky wasn’t playing into it. They’d brought her here to test him, to truly gauge what sort of a man he was when the chips were down. Was he the sort, for instance, to take advantage when given the opportunity, to give himself over to insidious thoughts because no one was watching, no one would care? After all, they’d think in their high castles, it’s not like Susi is a citizen, because Susi is a Jew. Soldiers do that sort of thing all the time, and Bucky’s a soldier, Bucky must be built that way, Bucky is-

 

He took a shuddering breath, pinched his nose harder.

 

 _No._ Bucky was not, and never would be, _that_.

 

 -

 

Later, when Sonofabitch returned and saw the pair of them hunkered down at opposite ends of the cell, he snarled. _What had he expected to see?_ Bucky thought scornfully, watching as the agent advanced further into the room towards him, spoiling for a fight. Well that was alright, Bucky didn’t mind.

 

In the corner, Susi had her hands over her mouth.

 

“Are you broken, soldier?” The agent was standing in front of him, his gait wide and his mouth drawn up into a disgusted smirk. The leather of his uniform creaked, and he stank like a tannery. “Did that fall steal your _prowess_ as well as your dignity?”

 

“Nah, pal,” Bucky drawled, somehow still managing to sound cocksure as he shivered against the cold stone biting into his bare back. He grinned. “It just ain’t in me to force a gal. You understand there’s a difference, yeah?”

 

His voice had always gotten him out of trouble before. Its deep cadence, like the slow drip of molasses from the lip of a jar, always struck a dark, warming note in the ear of the listener. They would bend to him, forgive him, because people with voices like treacle could never be too bad, not really. Strange how no matter what he said, how he phrased it, no matter the lilt, Hydra never bent to it.

 

Sonofabitch hit him hard about the face – Susi gasped loud – and he tasted blood.  

 

-

 

When Bucky joined the army, he knew that he would see and do things that would change him. He accepted that pain came part and parcel with the job, and that protecting your country, as well as your rights and the rights of others, meant a deal of personal sacrifice. He expected trauma, maybe even torture, but he felt certain that death or rescue would release him if things got too much. You didn’t go into the army expecting to come out whole. You didn’t go in expecting to come out alive.   

 

Still, as he was strapped down to the metal table yet again he couldn’t help but wonder, if he’d known this would become a normal, near-everyday occurrence, would his past self still have signed himself over? Would the Howlies have blamed him, called him a coward, if he’d backed away from this? Or would they have agreed that yeah, maybe having the living shit electrocuted out of you on the daily was a bit beyond the line of duty?

 

The mirror hanging from the ceiling above the table made the whole ordeal so much worse. Each and every bolt that jolted through him made him spasm and cry, biting hard into the mouth guard until the taste of the plastic choked him, and though he kept his eyes squeezed shut as much as was physically possible, as the voltage surged up and up he couldn’t control how his lashes fluttered, or hide from what he saw laid out above him.

 

It was the metal arm more than the rest of it that upset him. The other ravages - purpling bruises, burns, cuts, scars – these he could understand, and the sight of them marking his skin didn’t unsettle him as much as the sight of the arm. While the rest of him jerked and twisted to the will of the current, the metal arm just lay there, too heavy to move, fingers not even twitching. And it was the size of the thing as well, bulky even for his muscular, athletic frame. Maybe they expected him to grow into it? He began to laugh then, the sound gruff and maniacal in that large, empty room. The technicians in the control box looked at one another, beginning to smile.  

 

Well, thought Bucky, they’d have a long damn time to wait. _He wasn’t a_ _super soldier…_   

 

-

 

Bucky’s entire body was in spasm, rocking with the aftershocks of the electricity. It seemed to have gone on for _so-much-longer_ this time, like Sonofabitch really wanted to pay him out for not taking Hydra’s bait. He hardly recognised the corridors he was being hauled down, or feel the roughness of the cobbles beneath him, scraping the skin from his heels as he was dragged along by the underarms. Lights flashed above him, cold and sterile, adding to the acuteness of the nausea that swept through his insides like a crashing tide. When the guards finally dropped him to the floor of the cell all he could do was curl in on himself, clench, and wait for the shakes and the sweating to stop. He barely heard them leave, or registered the jangle of keys as they locked him in.  

 

He’d been ill like this once, maybe. In that three-storey walk up with that small, scrappy guy taking care of him, mopping his brow, changing his sheets, glaring down at his convulsing limbs with a determination so strong it had made Bucky’s lips twitch against the fever. _Damn it Buck, come on!_ Delirium made everything so funny, made Steve’s pinched, angry eyes seem the bluest of blue. He was a stubborn one, that guy, would never let himself or anyone he loved be defeated – even by pneumonia.     

 

Coming back to himself was a long, arduous process. The slide had been so very welcome that time, and leaving the over-warm, over-bright, over-protective embrace of that particular memory tore at Bucky worse than the torture he had just endured. Steve’s face hovered above him, flickering from weary to fierce to fearful to feminine to- Susi. It was Susi.    

 

The girl was crouched next to him, not too close and not touching. He wondered if she’d been watching over him all this time. Her head was bent in his direction, her eyebrows knit like she was trying to figure out what to say, and the angle of her neck made the curls of her hair tumble forwards. _Pretty_. Pretty like that time he’d got a bottle smashed over his head in a barroom brawl and woken up under the calm, compassionate hand of a nurse, picking the glass shards out of his hair. She’d been a brunette too, that doe-eyed nurse, and she’d been so kind and so sweet and she’d tasted like-

 

“No…” he groaned weakly.

 

Bucky hadn’t expected Susi to still be in the cell when they’d brought him back. Maybe it was naïve of him, but Bucky had hoped that his refusal would prompt her removal, if not from the base than at least from his sight. He let out a soft, pained whine, not sure if he could take this, _take her._ He felt sick, dizzy, and he just needed somebody to soothe him, to tell him-

 

“You’re alright,” Susi was saying. She sounded sure as fate. “You’re alright.”

 

Her hands were palm flat, her fingers spread out like pale stars over the cell floor, a few inches from his face. From his foetal position Bucky concentrated on the compacted dirt he could see under her nails, how the tendons in her knuckles flexed as she bore her weight forwards. There was coarse, uneven stitching along the hem of her dress and the colour of the thread didn’t match the fabric. Concentrating hard eased the shakes a little, helped him feel less off-kilter because the room hardly seemed to spin when he was looking at the webbed skin between each of her fingers.

 

“You’re alright,” she kept chanting, slow and solemn with that accent so unfamiliar but steady, consistent. “You’re alright, Sergeant Barnes.”

 

Steve had done this, so many times. After Bucky had been released from the clutches of Zola he had needed it so badly, so keenly, just to get through the night. There had been moments, out in that great, green forest with the earthy wetness all around him when the canvass above his head had felt like stretched, white, surgical cloth, and he had been helpless on his back, whimpering at the prospect of more pain, more invasion, and he had needed someone to bring him back, to talk him round from the terror. _You’re alright, Buck_. Steve had learned that touching him in this state made Bucky flinch and snivel like a weakling, too caught up to realise that a hand on his shoulder was a comfort, not a restraint, too blisteringly afraid to recognise his best pal leaning over him, speaking so sure, so softly – _You’re alright, Buck, it’s just me. You ain’t there no more, Buck, you’re alright._ Bucky wanted to cry. He wanted Steve.  

 

When he was eventually able to sit up, he braced himself against the edge of his cot, wincing as he stretched his legs out in front of him. Every inch of him hurt like the blazes. Well, not every inch. The _thing_ at his side seemed totally indifferent to the situation, like always. Only the red, raised skin around the metal shoulder ached, and even that seemed detached, somehow. Looking up through his sweat-soaked lashes, he caught Susi staring at it again and he tried not to let her see the discomfort wrought within him by her gaze.

 

If he ever made it out of there – _and the prospect of that happening seemed pretty damn remote_ – he imagined such a stare would become something he’d have to get used to. He wondered if people on the street would view him with the same sort of pity they reserved for invalided vets, shipped back missing arms and legs, using crutches to propel themselves about, holding their sleeves up with safety pins. Somehow he doubted it, because the metal arm – however much he hated to admit it – made him whole in a way those vets weren’t, at least on the surface of things, and that’s all anybody ever seemed to care about.

 

“Thanks doll,” he said, his tongue feeling thick in his mouth. He blinked hard, trying to keep her in focus. She’d scooted back from him again, her guard back up now he was somewhat sensible. Bucky felt a stab of frustration. Who did she think he was? Why had he just gone through all that? Wait. _No._ That gentlemanly soldier boy chastised him then, reminding him that gallantry was its own reward. Bucky tried to smile, saying, “Just needed a minute. Sorry if I scared ya, darlin’.”

 

“You don’t scare me,” she said defiantly, jutting her chin up. A pause. “None of you men scare me.”  

 

Bucky contemplated her for a minute or two, trying to repress the very real anger that had flared up behind his aching temples at her words. _Goddamn._ His temper was on such a short fuse nowadays, like he was losing grip on the moorings of decent, Christian forgiveness. Taking a steadying breath, he merely jerked his head to the side in dismissal. It wasn’t her fault, he thought darkly, she didn’t know him, had never seen him before in her life. Maybe in film reels, maybe in newspapers, he couldn’t remember how the world worked anymore with this creeping, blurring, _noise_ in his head-

 

He pushed his flesh hand through his dark hair, pushing it back off his forehead. He wanted a barber to trim it, he wanted pomade, he wanted someone to shave him, he wanted clean clothes and wholesome food and a bed that wasn’t like lying on a thousand nails and he wanted her to _shut up_ , needed her to know-

 

“Don’t talk about them and me as if we’re one and the same,” he muttered, resentful despite his best efforts not to be. “I know what it looks like-” He flexed the fingers of the metal arm and Susi stiffened. Biting his lip, Bucky covered the metal fist with his flesh fingers and squeezed, tamping down the unfamiliar, welling rage. What was happening to him? “I know how this must seem, but I ain’t them and they sure as hell ain’t me and if they think they can break me by putting you in here, riling me up some, well they’ve got another thing coming.” He paused, gasping. “I’m not an animal, I’m not a fucking, rutting _beast_ , and I will strap _myself_ down on that damn table and _fry myself_ _to death_ before I let them turn me into one. You understand, yeah? You see that I won’t do it don’t you, darlin’, please? Please?”

 

The words had run out of him like so much blood. How had he gone from feeling so calm and assured to being so desperate in a heartbeat? Had Hydra finally loosened his tongue, unhinged his brain, with all their ugliness? He thought of all the times he had refused to weaken in front of them, in front of anyone, and imagined the disappointment that would’ve flashed across Steve’s face had he been there. Steve could forgive him for just about anything, but Bucky doubted he’d understand this.  

 

“M’sorry…” he murmured, finally, because Susi looked so stricken and he hated it, because he’d never made a girl look like that before in his entire life. He felt dirty and low, lower than the rats that scuttled about him in the dark.

 

It was a shock when she touched him. She had brushed her fingertips along the darkening strap marks across his bicep and forearm, obviously trying to suppress her disgust at the singed hair and oily residue of burned leather clinging to his skin. Her large, brown eyes moved up to search his face, lingering on the cracked edges of his lips, where the mouth guard had cut in. When their eyes met, Bucky thought he saw what he needed to see and he had to resist the instinct to lean in and bury his face against her shoulder and weep. He wasn’t used to feeling such rawness in himself, a lingering vestige of the unnerving vulnerability that had settled into his bones since he’d lain out in the snow, stunned and abandoned. _He was so tired._  

 

“ _Oy vey…_ ” Susi exclaimed softly, and he almost jumped a foot when she patted his cheek. Her entire demeanour softened towards him in that moment, as if she’d suddenly seen how close he was to tears. Smiling ruefully, she tentatively moved to rest her back beside him against the edge of the cot. Hesitating only for a moment, she pushed firmly at the back of Bucky’s neck, getting him to bend into her. He let himself do it, uncoiling like a too-tight spring. Susi gave a long, heavy sigh. “ _Gay shlafen_ , soldier. You’re not going to hurt me. Rest your head on me, _boychick…_ ”     

 

It wasn’t long before he fell into a relieved, bottomless sleep against her, made blissful by her smell, her warmth, and by the absence of dreams. 

 

-

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Leibchen_ = Sweetheart (German)
> 
>  _Oy Gavalt!_ = A cry of fear or a cry for help.*  
>  _Oy vey_ = "Oh, how terrible things are."  
>  _Gay shlafen_ = Go to sleep.  
>  _boychick_ = An affectionate term for a young boy. 
> 
> [I wanted Susi to employ Yiddish phrases. I apologise if I have used them incorrectly.  
> *Thanks to Marissa for the correction, very much appreciated!]


	2. Breaking Bare Branches

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Please be aware this chapter contains some antisemitic themes/language. This is for narrative purposes and is not meant to offend.]

 

She didn’t know what time it was, just that it was early. It must have been hours before the siren, as the gates to the loading dock were chained up tight, and the empty streets of the ghetto around her resonated with an eerie silence. The only sounds came from the group of German soldiers at her back, who stood together, muttering languidly and smoking cigarettes in the dawn light. The line of men and women around her were as quiet as the grave, hardly a whimper stirring the tight, claustrophobic air. She was proud of them for that, but sad too that she would never hear their voices again.

 

 _At least, not in this life._       

 

The morning was cold, wet, and the sky a piercing white above their heads, with blackened, bare branches reaching out over the ghetto wall, like so many searching fingers trying to pluck her away. Susi stood in front of the wall, her hands braced behind her head, looking up into the endless clouds so as to avoid looking at the bullet holes ripped into the plasterwork before her nose. Beside her she felt Mischa doing the same, breathing hard, and though she wished he wasn’t there, a small, selfish slice of her soul was glad she wasn’t about to die alone. 

 

Mischa was a large, kind man, with fists as big as his heart. Even standing in his shadow, Susi felt his protection. She could also feel how much he was suffering, could almost hear his frantic thoughts buzzing impotently in the air around them. He was still trying to think of a way out of this, and she wanted more than anything to hold his hand in hers and bless him, to apologise to him – _to all of them_ – for the mess she had created with that one, little mistake. Just a moment of indecision on her part had cost them all their lives.

 

Susi hadn’t known what to expect when she’d been hauled out of the line-up; but then she had seen the badges of Hydra, the red skull.

 

The scream that tore through her throat was tinged with the taste of blood, and then Mischa was shouting for her, shouting at _them_ as they grabbed a hold of her, and she was being pulled and pushed away from her comrades towards the bed of a military truck. The commotion followed her, and as she kicked and bellowed, she heard Mischa fighting, and as she was being forced into the vehicle she saw him being restrained and all of the others breaking from the line-up, surging forwards-

 

“ _Halt! Stój!_ ”

 

“Don’t! Mischa! _Luzzem!_ No-!”

 

A volley of gunshots ripped through the shouting, but Susi didn’t hear it. She was out cold before the last of the bodies hit the ground, the yellow stars on their backs forever seared like solder onto the surface of her mind’s eye.

 

-

 

Bucky woke with a jerk as his head struck the floor, the sound of clanging metal and jangling keys more disorientating than the sudden shift of his body. _What-_ His cheek was still warm from where it’d been pressed against Susi’s arm, but Susi wasn’t there anymore. He groped about in momentary terror, until he looked up and saw her at the opposite end of the cell, staring at him with a finger pressed tight to her lips. She shook her head at him slightly as the cell door swung open and Sonofabitch strode in, swaggering like it was payday. Two guards followed, flanking the exit.

 

“Well soldier,” the agent sneered, coming to stand tall over Bucky. The smell of leather and rotting meat returned with him, only so much stronger than before. Bucky wanted to wretch. “I see you have recovered a little from your ordeal, yes?”

 

Sonofabitch’s hand was wrapped around the handle of the stun baton, cradling it, and Bucky eyed it warily. The sneer, the swagger – both told him that if he tried to sit up, his bones would be lit up in seconds. He decided it would be wiser to stay where he was for the time being, though his stomach balked angrily at the indignity of laying curled up at the feet of _this man_.    

 

“I hope we weren’t too hard on you, soldier…”

 

The agent grinned, eyes boring into Bucky’s, challenging him to answer back. Bucky bit his tongue. He could hear Susi’s shallow breathing from across the cell, and he latched onto it, letting it centre him. He could feel that unfamiliar welling of rage building within him again, pulling at his raw edges. Sonofabitch’s expression, so sure and secretly gleeful, told Bucky that he should come to expect the feeling from now on, and that Hydra knew _exactly_ what it meant. They were changing him.

 

The agent continued his verbal prodding with a smirk, “But you know, Barnes, a little electricity can be very good for you. I’ve heard some people say it can be used to cure _insanity_ …”

 

Convulsive therapy, yeah, Bucky had heard of it. Pretty new, pretty untested, mostly dangerous. It’s what they did to people with schizophrenia, epilepsy, _but he wasn’t-_ That being said, he sincerely doubted that what Hydra practiced on him on that blasted metal slab held any resemblance to real medicine, real cures. Though the technicians did wear white coats, _like doctors would_ , and they did shoot him up with paralytics so he couldn’t move, _like orderlies might_ , and the big, empty room where he screamed and shook was padded, _like restraint rooms in asylums might be_ , and they wore those rubber gloves as they handled him, turned him, and-   

 

“Now that you have been _treated_ , soldier, perhaps you are ready to sample your gift?”

 

Bucky clamped down on the inclination to whine, coming back to himself with a horrid jolt. The stench of his own singed skin filled his nostrils and he gagged, moaning under his breath. He’d lost track of himself. Let himself slide away into recollection when he needed to be present. _Useless._ He looked up into the agent’s face, hating him. _So, they really weren’t gonna let this go, huh?_ Susi didn’t say anything at all, and Bucky refused to catch her eye despite the discomfort. He knew that to look at her, even for a moment, might betray weakness, and Sonofabitch just _loved_ seeing Bucky’s weaknesses.

 

“No?”

 

Sonofabitch cocked his eyebrow, before wrenching the baton free from its holster, roughly grabbing the back of Bucky’s hair and pulling him up on his knees. Exquisite pain licked up Bucky’s body in an instant, radiating from his taut thighs, up his spine, converging on the point of contact at his scalp. It was like being doused with freezing water, washing away the lingering blurriness in his aching, scorched brain. He let himself gasp out a curse, but he refused to struggle.

 

Softly, almost lovingly, the agent pressed the tip of the baton against Bucky’s temple.

 

“Really Sergeant Barnes, I heard you had far better manners than this. Famous for your _charm_ aren’t you, soldier? But when the Fuhrer sees it in his mercy to offer you a _present_ , what do you do?”

 

The fingers in Bucky’s hair tightened, and he winced, feeling several strands parting ways with his scalp.

 

“Won’t you even open it?” The agent hissed, and the tip of the baton dragged harshly from Bucky’s temple to his cheek. Susi’s breathing had gotten louder, faster. The agent’s voice had turned silky deadly, and Bucky didn’t know how to respond, what to expect. “How do you know you won’t like it, without even looking? I think perhaps it will change your mind.” A pause, barely the space of a heartbeat. “Yes, I really do. _Schnell!_ ” 

 

With a whir of awful activity, the guards had advanced into the cell, dragging Susi up by the arms, yanking her forwards. Her feet scrambled against the cobbled floor as they elevated her, forcing her back to arch. The buttons on the front of her dress strained before they tore, popping open under rough, gloved hands. Susi’s ragged sobs were loud in Bucky’s ears, and he didn’t know what he could possibly say that would make it better for her. His tongue was like cast lead in his mouth.

 

“You see, Sergeant!” The agent shouted above the noise of the struggle, “Beautiful breasts, no? Even for a dirty, rebellious _Jude_.”

 

Sonofabitch’s spit flecked the side of Bucky’s face as the agent pushed himself into his peripheral vision, trying to yank his head around to look, to _stare_. Bucky resisted, though from the very corner of his eye Susi’s sky blue dress blurred, a streak of flesh indistinct between torn fabric. Bucky’s cheeks grew hot, repulsed desire curling up from his belly, because he hadn’t seen or touched a naked woman in _Jesus,_ he didn’t know how long, and the _curves of her_ cried out to him on some disgusting, primal level and _God, no_ \- Utterly ashamed of himself, Bucky wouldn’t look, _couldn’t look_. He’d promised.

 

“ _Fort aykh avek aleyn_ …”

 

As Susi gasped, Bucky caught the tears in her words, the helplessness she felt, and his very soul echoed that helplessness back at her, because he was so sorry, so very sorry for everything that had happened to her since she’d met him, but what the _hell_ could he be expected to do about it? His chest had begun to ache for her, the anger rearing like a snake readying itself to strike, spreading hatred like venom throughout his bruised and battered body. The tip of the stun baton barely registered against his cheek, like the pain it might inflict didn’t matter anymore.

 

It began to happen very gradually. Later, Bucky would try to pin down the exact moment he became aware of the metal arm flexing, whirring inexplicably to life, but he could never be entirely sure. The only thing he knew for certain was that Hydra had won, made the _thing_ a part of him after all his fighting. _They’d won_.  

 

“You’ve upset her, Sergeant. See how she cries?” The agent tutted absurdly, relaxing his grip on Bucky’s hair so that he slouched forwards against the floor, panting for breath. The agent moved a step towards Susi instead, raising his gloved fingers to caress her cheek. “She thinks you don’t want her, Barnes.” A possessive chuckle. Susi flinched. “Don’t worry _Leibchen_ , you’re more than enough for me-” 

 

“ _Halt! Stój!_ ”

 

The metal fist cracked the cobbles of the cell floor with a heart-stopping, earth-shattering crash. Bucky hadn’t known he was about to do it, or even what it might mean, but suddenly there it was, cutting silver through the air before his eyes and breaking harsh against stone, drawing all attention away from Susi and onto himself. Turning at once, Sonofabitch’s eyes widened and his mouth tugged into a satisfied grin, and he was laughing triumphantly at Bucky, then he was darting for the cell door-

 

A red mist had descended on him within seconds, and all at once it was like he was back on the battlefield, cut off from the 107th, from the Howlies, from Steve, but still there, still alone, still fighting on. Something was different now though, instinctually wrong, because when he had been Captain America’s chief sniper he’d been sombre and calculating but never cold, never so _detached_. Killing the guards holding Susi should have sparked something in him, but striding forwards, hauling them up against his chest, snapping their necks under the metal arm like they were chickens for the pot, he felt nothing _. He felt_ _absolutely nothing._     

 

He didn’t even catch Susi’s frightened scream, or see how desperately she tried to scramble away from him. His mind had become blissfully blank, silent. He had somehow been lifted out of the horror of his actions and was able to stand apart from them, as though separated from the atrocity by a veil.

 

_He drifted away._

 

The first time he’d killed a man his legs had turned to jello, his stomach had screwed itself into knots, and he’d vomited on his own boots. The service revolver had felt branded to Bucky’s palm, his fingers unwilling to unclench from around the handle. The reverb from the shot had shuddered along his arm, up his neck, made every hair on his body stand on end, and for the briefest of moments all he had wanted to do was run home to Brooklyn, tail between his legs, righteous war be damned. He’d wanted to pound up the stairs to that three-storey walk up, smash through the door, grab Steve round the middle and bury his face against the man’s thin, scrawny chest and sob, until the coppery taste in his mouth gave way to flesh and blood, until he’d feel alive again. The inclination had been momentary, the shock fleeting, then another German soldier had reared into view through the battle smoke, and he’d raised the revolver and screamed himself sober, killing, killing, and killing again because not killing would mean never seeing home.

 

He remembered telling Steve about it, after Zola, huddled under canvass in the earthy wetness of the great, green forest, and it had felt like confessing to a priest, because even with the serum, even with the extra bulk and the license to murder, Steve had still felt like Bucky’s saviour, the most decent man Bucky had ever known. Steve had rested a large hand on the back of his neck, squeezing, leaning close and saying softly, _You did what you had to do Buck, there ain’t no shame in it_ , and then resting his nose in Bucky’s hair and breathing so deep, whispering, _Don’t be sorry for keeping yourself safe for me._ Bucky had felt absolved.

 

He didn’t know if he could be absolved for _this_ , because _this_ was crushing the life out of two men and not even breaking a sweat, and did feeling nothing as their bodies dropped mean he kinda liked it? The metal arm had whirred, the plates purring, as though happy to have finally seen some use, while the rest of his body remained numb, his features stoic in his mind’s absence. He didn’t know where Sonofabitch had disappeared to, just that he wasn’t there, but the harsh, rich laughter that had preceded Bucky’s break from reality still seemed to ring about the walls of the cell, growling and swelling, circling Bucky as he continued to stand straight and tall, the muscles of his back and thighs taut and twitching, his gaze far off and unrelenting. It was as though he was waiting for someone to tell him it was alright for him to move again, that he had done well, but no one spoke, because they were dead, because he had killed them.  

 

It was the sound of Susi hyperventilating that finally brought Bucky back, the terrified relief pouring from her lips giving him permission to exist. It was alright because it had been for her, or at least that’s what he firmly told himself as he moved to help her fix her dress.

 

-

 

The agent slumped against the wall of the corridor, fumbling for his communicator as his heart beat a harsh mantra behind his ribs. The grin was wide on his lips even as his hands trembled. The sound of bones cracking, of breath being cut short, thundered in his ears. In spite of this inconvenient remembrance, he felt galvanised by success. Everything was going exactly to plan.

 

“The device has taken.” He spoke into the communicator, proudly awaiting praise. Surely, this would mean elevation, _respect_. “I repeat: _The device has taken!_ The Sergeant is as good as ours.”  

 

“Excellent work!” The responding voice was pleased, but far off, miles away. “You’ve done well. We can continue as scheduled. I think it might be time to inform the Sergeant of the fate of Captain Rogers.” There was a crackle from the communicator, as though the voice were meditating. “Any losses?”

 

“Two,” The agent wouldn’t let himself dwell on the expressions of betrayal that had flashed through the dark as he’d rushed from the cell. It wasn’t his fault that they hadn’t been quick enough. “Braun and Wolf are dead.”

 

“A pity.” A spike of static made the agent wince. Was that judgement he heard? His body bristled with indignation, but it soon passed. “May they find order through pain. _Hail Hydra!_ ”   

 

“ _Hail Hydra_ , Obergruppenführer.”

 

-

 

The sniper jacket had retained its brilliant night-time blue, despite being drenched in freezing snow and stained down the left side with blood. One of the sleeves was mostly missing, obviously, but the majority of the buttons remained intact. The front lapel was a little charred, smelling of burnt fabric, but altogether it was serviceable, good.

 

Bucky hadn’t dared wear it since his capture. What with everything that had happened, it just didn’t feel like his anymore. The man who had worn that jacket had been something like a hero, and with the fall, the sickening abandonment, the gradual stripping away of his bravado, he simply didn’t feel worthy to don the garb of a Howlie. At first he’d been surprised to find it in his cell, but he soon realised that Hydra had only let him keep it as a way to taunt him, to remind him of what he had been and would never be again.

 

Bucky pulled the jacket out from under the cot, hesitated, then moved to drape it gingerly over Susi’s shaking shoulders. With as much gentleness as he could muster through his own state of shock, Bucky urged her to put her arms through the sleeves. _You’ll be warmer, doll, come on…_ He made a show of officious detachment as he pulled the front of the jacket closed over her bare breasts, batting her trembling hands aside impatiently when she took too long over the fastenings. _Let me darlin’, you’re alright…_ He didn’t mean to be unfeeling, but the sight of her naked skin made bile rise in his throat, compounding his misery about what he’d just let happen.

 

When it was done, when she seemed decent and a degree calmer, he crouched down on his haunches in front of her and let his eyes roam free, assessing the damage he’d caused. Her dark curls were in disarray, but he didn’t smooth them back. His gaze lingered too long on the purpling bruises, glaring like handprints stamped over the exposed skin of her upper arm. The guards must have held on pretty hard, before he’d pulled them off, ended them.

 

“You,” Susi started, but she had to stop at once, like there was no air left in her lungs to breathe with. Bucky watched her carefully, guiltily tracking her tongue as it flicked out to wet her lower lip. Taking a deep breath, Susi began again. She wasn’t meeting his gaze. Instead, she was looking at the corpses next to her on the ground. “You moved like I’ve never seen anyone move before. One second you were on the floor, the next you were-”

 

“I know,” he replied in a small voice, the smallest he had ever used. “I don’t know how it happened.”      

 

He looked down at the metal arm, now seemingly dormant at his side, and he wondered. It was like the _thing_ had responded to his helplessness, giving him strength and conviction to act when he hadn’t known what to do for the best.

 

“And you spoke German.”

 

Bucky’s chin jerked up immediately and his mouth dropped open.

 

“What?”

 

Susi clutched at the sniper jacket he’d given her, pulling it close as she shivered with renewed revolution. She buried her nose into the collar, inhaled the strong scent of masculine sweat and her eyes filled with tears again, because it made her want Mischa. She wanted more than anything to be held, but also never to be touched again. Her body hurt from mistreatment, and her mind reeled, but she knew what she’d heard, and it filled her with a mistrust she had hoped to leave far behind her.

 

“Just before you-” She knew her cheeks were wet, and the lost expression on Bucky’s face only made them wetter, but she had to say it. “ _Halt! Stój!_ You told them to stop. You sounded _just_ like them! Who are you? Really? Tell me!”    

 

It took him longer to remember than it probably should have done, but the fact that the words still came when they were needed was relief like Bucky had never known it.

 

“Barnes, James Buchanan; Sergeant; 32-55-70-38, at your service Ma’m.” He dipped his head deferentially, put his flesh hand over his frantically beating heart and continued repeating it until she stopped him.

 

“And do you speak German, Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes?”

 

“No, Ma’m.” He dropped back on his heels, craning his neck to look up at the fathomless ceiling. He didn’t know what he was searching for in the darkness above, just that something was needed, something familiar. “I ain’t never spoke a word of German before in my life. Learning languages wasn’t exactly encouraged growing up. No time for it in Brooklyn, when you gotta finish school early to go down the docks. Knowing how to apologize to the landlord in three different tongues won’t help you pay him the rent you’re owing.”

 

She stared at him, not understanding.

 

What he’d described was a thousand miles away from Susi’s childhood, the contrast so sharp that it cut through her fear and made her think longingly of home, standing in her father’s study, listening to him talk about where an education could get you in life. He had been a professor of languages before the war, and though such a position had proved his downfall when the Nazis invaded, Susi knew he would never have regretted his choice. _She didn’t._ Polish, Yiddish, English, French, she knew them all as intimately as her closest friends, so intimately in fact that she hardly knew in what language she dreamed.   

 

“And what if you can’t ‘go down the docks’?” she asked, dumbly. “What if you don’t want to?”

 

“Then you starve.” Bucky rolled his shoulders, coughed awkwardly. He rubbed the back of his neck with his flesh fingers, while his metal hand clenched on the floor beside his foot. “Well, unless you can find someone to take care of you.”

 

Steve’s angry, too thin face lunged out of the darkness then, and the recollection of the asthmatic rattle of his breath seemed to hang about Bucky’s ears, distracting him. He had been sweating buckets that day, cheeks reddened, and voice almost gone with the pain of speaking. _I ain’t gonna be a liability anymore, Buck, I’m not your damn wife!_ And Bucky had pushed him down on the sofa, climbed over him, and made him listen.

 

“Do you take care of someone, Sergeant Barnes?” Susi asked with genuine curiosity, her voice soft again.

 

Yes, he’d slipped away, she understood that, but she had to find the wherewithal to trust him. Hearing him talk of his upbringing, hearing him hint at someone he professed to love, served to humanise him again after that sudden show of mechanical brutality. The man’s jacket was warm about her, comforting because it had belonged to someone good, someone real. She had seen a photograph of Sergeant Barnes wearing it on the front page of a newspaper, the torn, muddied scrap having blown over the ghetto wall so many months ago. Could such a strong, confident figure have been turned into a monster by Hydra? She didn’t think so. Susi simply couldn’t believe that anyone who wished her ill would be so liberal with their generosity. Only the smallest doubt clung on in the back of her mind, and it was connected to the memory of the blank, soulless expression Bucky had worn as he’d snapped both guards like so many brittle twigs.

 

Bucky shrugged at her question, not looking at her. He was looking at the wall behind her head, remembering all the little, seemingly insignificant moments in that three-storey walk up in Brooklyn, back in the days when he would have done anything in the whole world to keep some guy safe and closeted. He remembered all the fights he’d had with Steve about girls, about money, about what they could afford and what they couldn’t, about what Steve was capable of doing and what he sure as hell wasn’t gonna do. _I swear Stevie, you’re gonna kill yourself and then where will I be, huh? You’re such a selfish asshole!_ He remembered all the times Steve had made himself sick from working, just so he could put extra bread on the table. It was all to satisfy some blasted, wounded pride, because Steve knew Bucky would have robbed a bank to keep them fed, if it’d come to it. The man was a punk.

 

Bucky didn’t wanna forget that. He didn’t wanna forget Steve. 

  

“If I, er…” Bucky shifted uncomfortably, pinching the bridge of his nose. It had become a nervous habit. “If I do or say something you don’t think is right, ya know, if I start speaking like a Kraut again or whatever, then you do what you gotta do to protect yourself. I don’t think it’ll happen again, I just…” Bucky shook his head, bone weary from doubt. The broken bodies of the two guards strayed in from the shadows, drawing his eye. He tried to ignore the cold sweat breaking out over his brow at the implications of them. He tried to smile. “I just don’t wanna do anything improper, you understand? Don’t want to hurt you any.”   

 

After a long, tense silence, Susi nodded, sighing, “Alright, Sergeant.”

 

She didn’t give voice to what she was actually thinking, to what they both _knew_. If Bucky did slip off into violence again there would be absolutely no way she could defend herself against the metal arm’s possession of his body. She would be easily overpowered, and she would die, and Bucky wouldn’t know it until it was too late to stop.

 

Bucky fought against the pained lump rising in his throat as Susi bridged the gap between them, pressing a grateful kiss to the curve of his cheek.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Again, I have tried to use phrases from different languages for atmosphere. I apologise if I have used them incorrectly.]
> 
>  _Halt! Stój!_ = Stop! (German)  
>  _Schnell_ = Quick, an order to action (German)  
>  _Jude_ = A derogatory name for a Jewish person (German)  
>  _Leibchen_ = Sweetheart (German)
> 
>  _Luzzem_ = Let him/her go (Yiddish)  
>  _Fort aykh aver aleyn_ = Leave me alone! (Yiddish)
> 
>  _Kraut_ = A derogatory name for a German, particularly used by English-speakers following WW1.


	3. Torn Threads

 

Since his capture, Bucky had gotten used to a certain level of routine. While Hydra weren’t exactly what you’d call the perfect hosts, they at least tended to his most basic needs.

 

He was fed every morning and night - small portions of something indescribably bland pushed through a slot in the cell door on a dirty, tin tray. No cutlery allowed, for obvious reasons.

 

Once a week they escorted him to the communal showers for a wash and brush up. They’d watch him, guns trained on his back as he stripped and stood beneath the spray. He’d dutifully pretend he was alone as he soaped off seven days’ worth of stink, trying not to shudder at the feel of eyes on his naked, broken body. Squaring his shoulders, tightening his jaw, he just plain got on with it. Anything to be clean - _to feel even slightly human._

 

Twice a week he was toted from his cell to visit the base physician, whose job – as far as he could tell – was to make sure Bucky’s ill-treatment wasn’t verging on the wrong side of life threatening. He’d tut and scold in German as he poked and prodded at various new cuts and contusions, but he’d never really _do_ anything, would never really _help_ at all. Bucky noted how the doctor steadfastly refused to go near his metal arm, barely consenting to touch the raised, red skin around it with his gloved fingers. Whether the man was scared or disgusted by it, Bucky could never tell.

 

Then of course, _every day_ he was taken to that dreaded lab with the metal table, strapped down and made to _sing_ by the technicians in the control box - and every day he was brought back, barely knowing his own name.

 

Having Susi in his cell disrupted this routine.

 

It started with the food.

 

Maybe half a day had passed since the incident with the guards, when the slot in the cell door had slid open once more and the tin tray was pushed inside. _Evening then,_ Bucky thought placidly from his hunched position against the cot, adjusting his mental calendar. The tray rattled across the cobbled floor, the brownish soup slopping over the edges of the bowl as it came to a halt before them. The two prisoners watched the slot in the door expectantly, waiting for a second tray to appear. When it didn’t Bucky sighed impatiently, pinching his nose before directing his gaze to Susi. She was sitting cross-legged with her back to the wall, wrapped up tight in his torn sniper jacket, head tilted downwards, the skin of her cheeks and forehead pale and glistening with sweat. _Beginning a fever?_ He frowned. Susi’s eyes were fixed on the tray.  

 

“Have at it, doll.” Bucky gestured good naturedly, even as his stomach moaned in protest. “I had something yesterday, I can wait awhile longer.” His stomach moaned again and he grimaced at it, trying to concentrate. “Or maybe it was the day before… Things have gotten a little irregular since you showed up, ya know?”  

 

Susi smiled wanly at Bucky, and tried to remember the last time she had eaten anything.

 

Surely it must have been just before that final, ill-fated meeting of the ghetto resistance, sat in her family’s cramped kitchen with her mother and Mischa?

 

The air had felt uncomfortably warm and close about them, like it always did in that overcrowded block of flats. Six families were packed to the rafters of their apartment building, and the smell and sweat of them all seeped everywhere, rising up from between the floorboards and creeping under the gaps of the warped doors.

 

The last of the candle ration burned on the table between the three of them, adding its waxy aroma to the scent of unwashed bodies and stewed vegetables. Susi remembered the familiar faces of her mother and lover bathed in an orange glow, dark shadows pouring into the nooks and crannies of their features as they’d sipped weak tea and munched at stale bread. Mischa had brought the loaf especially as a present for Susi’s mother, who’d laughed and kissed his blushing cheek. Susi had teased him for his brutish shyness, and he’d squeezed her fingers beside his plate, rubbing his thumb over where a wedding ring should’ve been, grinning.

 

He had seemed overly large at their little table, all broad shoulders and big hands beside the slighter frames of the women. Susi could never decide if she liked it or not, the impressive breadth of him. Her father’s absence was made all the more conspicuous by Mischa’s masculine bulk, his presence a trial as well as a comfort as it reminded the mother and daughter of what they had lost.

 

  _And_ _of what might still come for them all..._   

 

Heat welled behind her eyes at the recollection, and as she accepted Bucky’s generous offer she ducked her head in an attempt to hide it. Drawing the tray towards her she picked up the dish, but with no utensils she was forced to raise it to her lips and sip. The soup was awful brackish, and though she grimaced at the tasteless chill of it she found herself sighing with satisfaction at how it filled her hollow stomach. Stone cold, it sat like a hard lump in her belly, but it was infinitely better than nothing.    

 

Bucky didn’t comment on the tears, guessing it was none of his business. However, as he watched her continue to eat in silence Bucky found his curiosity mounting. Since Susi’s arrival in the cell he had been wanting to know so much about her, about the world beyond the confines of the base, about how things had changed. He hadn’t been granted the opportunity to ask anything of importance – the successive incidents of the last 48 hours, combined with the awkward knowledge that Susi was the first decent human being Bucky had encountered in heaven knew how long, made the questions lie heavy on his tongue. Their forced intimacy in the little space made it all the more uncomfortable, but still, he was determined to be cordial and unobtrusive. That gentlemanly soldier boy would never stand for anything less, no matter how his outside might have changed, or how his subconscious raged.

 

Bucky didn’t remember much about talking to women, just that what they said was often measured, sweet, and sometimes vivacious. Blurred recollections of his previous life suggested to him that he’d once possessed a certain knack with courting female conversation, an ease that’d made his workmates green with jealousy every Saturday night. Bucky didn’t recall ever having trouble whisking dames down to beer dens like the Dew Drop Inn or Farrell’s Bar, where cigarette smoke hung heavy, the music was lively, and glasses twinkled, all smudged around the rims with lipstick traces. The faded, red leather that upholstered the barstools had left marks on his dates’ dresses and they’d sighed, feigning annoyance, but smiled so pretty in the half-light.

 

Odd bursts of indistinct memory thrust such details to the fore of Bucky’s befuddled mind, but what he’d _said_ on those Saturday nights still utterly escaped him. Had there really been something so winning in his smile, in the touch of his hand at a girl’s waist, to have made them unbend to him, grace him with a laugh or appreciative murmur? Had there been pick-up lines, phrases, _propositions_ , that had broken them open, made them talk so easy in those secluded booths, over sticky cafe tables, in the line of ticket holders waiting outside the Grand Theatre in Brooklyn?

 

If he had to guess, Bucky thought it might’ve been as simple as displaying confident good humour, or just a willingness to listen as a lady unburdened her soul. He wondered if talking to them had been as straight-forward as talking to Steve, who’d always been hot-headed, quick and ready to divulge anything Bucky wanted to hear.

 

 _Sitting close on the sofa on weeknights, nursing beers, speaking soft but serious about how things couldn’t change, no matter how much they might want them to…_   

 

“Do you miss your man?” Bucky asked, so sudden he surprised himself. When Susi looked up at him with an arched brow he raised his flesh hand to the back of his neck and rubbed hard, shame-faced. “I just meant… Well, a gal like you gotta have a fella?”  

 

“I had somebody,” Susi replied eventually, speaking slow as though dragging the words up from some deep place. “Not that it matters much now.”

 

Bucky waited a heartbeat, wet his lips, then asked cautiously, “I’m sorry, is he…?”

 

“Dead?” Susi put the empty dish back on the tin tray with a loud rattle, before kicking it away across the cobbles. “I think so, or likely as good as. I heard the shots.”

 

“You didn’t see it?” Bucky ventured, and Susi had to think for a moment.

 

No, she had to admit that she hadn’t _seen it_ , not exactly. Forced down on the bed of the truck, it’d been difficult to keep a hold of anything through the terror. Though really, how else could such an altercation have ended? Mischa had been fighting tooth and nail to reach her, there had been so many soldiers, so many guns pointed at him in that desperate moment before darkness had took her. Surely no man, even one as impressive as Mischa, could have gotten through that alive. Besides, even if he had gotten away, how far could he have run in the dawn light? Unless someone in the ghetto had hidden him, unless he had waited until nightfall, crawled under the loose wire fencing by the loading dock, it wasn’t so difficult for one person to get out, just…

 

Bucky smiled softly at her lost, searching look.

 

“Don’t give up on him, doll.” He murmured kindly, even as Susi’s eyes glistened with despair. He let loose a low, macabre laugh, flexing the fingers of his metal hand absent-mindedly against the top of his thigh. Bucky furrowed his brow, wanting to pinch the bridge of his nose again, but resisting the urge. His mood had begun to flux slightly, moving incrementally towards the sombre and the vexed. He tried to grin. “There’s always hope, ya know. Look at me. God knows I should be dead as a doornail, and I’m still here.”  

 

Trying to distract herself from her misery for Mischa, Susi began to appraise Bucky from across the cell, wondering. His words had struck an uneasy chord. Since her imprisonment two days prior she had been puzzling over the problem of him, of how he could be living and breathing beside her when the whole of the Western world believed he was dead.

 

The fall of the Howling Commando had been reported far and wide, even reaching into her closed off little corner of hell, where the possession of newspapers or radios was strictly _verboten_. Still, the ghetto had its sources. It had been a real shock for the resistance to learn that such a critical blow had been struck to Captain America’s team. Some members worried it would derail allied incursions into the occupied territories, that the Howlies’ morale wouldn’t stand the loss of such a man as Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes. Then there had been rumblings of dissent, disinterest, resentment. Harsh words were thrown that the high and mighty Captain America would never have come to the aid of the resistance anyway, that he wasn’t interested in liberating those who could not fight for him, who would’ve slowed him down on his holy mission against Hydra.

 

Susi hadn’t known who to listen to in the whispered aftermath of the Sergeant’s fall, but she couldn’t help but feel genuinely sorry that some far off mother in some far off country had lost their son. _But then-_ The son lived, the son was near her. How it could’ve happened she didn’t think she’d ever understand, but there he was, alive and – _almost –_ whole.

 

For while she may never have met him out in the real world, Susi knew Bucky wasn’t quite right under Hydra. His moods and temperament were sporadic, unsettled, not to mention the _thing_ and all the trauma that implied.

 

The metal arm was the aspect she was struggling most to accept about her new situation, the unnatural meeting of man and machinery jarring her senses every time she looked at it. The red, raw skin joining it to Bucky’s left shoulder consistently drew her attention like a moth to a flame, raising questions she didn’t dare ask out loud but desperately needed answering. Susi couldn’t imagine the pain and fear Bucky must have endured in the fitting of it, the very idea of such a procedure turning the cold soup over in her stomach, churning it round.

 

And it wasn’t just the look or mechanics of the thing, it was the uncertainty it represented. So far, Bucky himself had made her feel safe and protected – _even when he’d failed_ \- but the metal arm offered her no such comfort. She was afraid to sleep, to drop her defences, lest she wake to find it pressed hard against her throat, choking the life out of her like it had those unfortunate guards. _Never mind that they had deserved it, it hadn’t been a just way to die_. And she didn’t like how it had changed Bucky so suddenly and completely, taking possession of him in a way she had never thought possible until she’d seen it happen for herself. All light and familiarity had vanished from him the moment the metal arm had whirred to life, and one look at his empty face had told her that nothing she could say or do would bring him back. It had been one of the most helpless moments of her entire life.   

 

“Why are you here, Sergeant Barnes? What does Hydra want with you?” Susi wondered softly, more to herself than to the cell at large, but Bucky jerked his head to the side in annoyed acknowledgement of the question. Her scrutiny was starting to rankle him, to prick like so many needles.

 

“Sometimes I think I know,” he replied curtly, trying to sound offhand and carefree even as his insides twisted violently. The slide was coming on strong and while he was trying to fight it off, maybe it would be kinda nice this time, just to forget himself _._ “But every time I think I know they put me back on that table and take it away again. Seems I can’t keep a hold of anything for too long up here-” He tapped the side of his head, and his voice turned nervous, unsure. The edges of his vision were becoming a little fractured. “Unless I’m reminded suddenly, or unless it matters a great deal to me, I just can’t…”

 

Susi blanched at that.

 

What must it be like, to have your memory tampered with day after day? It was no wonder he snapped at her, consoled her, spoke gentle then hard by turns; the threads of him must be unwinding faster than conscious thought could mend. And the physical side – her eyes traversed his bare, battled torso and the dark, burnished bruises left behind by the force of his restraints – it must feel like being beaten black and blue every wakeful second, the hateful addition of the metal arm only making it more difficult to contend with. And here she was – Susi gulped, feeling penitent and disgusted all at once – a walking, talking temptation served up by his captors to pull at his guilt and loneliness, to offer him a tainted, sordid comfort that went against the very core of him to accept.

 

She hadn’t noticed how harsh her breathing had become, or how her fists had clenched in her lap, until she noticed Bucky’s mouth tugging up at the edges in a washed-out, amused understanding. He looked so unbelievably tired, sat hunched against the side of the cot, right leg drawn up in front of him, real arm slung across it and fingers itching in the air like he was dying for a cigarette to distract him from his troubles. The metal arm lay dormant at his side, looking oddly separate from the rest of him even as he rolled his left shoulder to elevate the ache of the machine’s weight. Susi couldn’t suppress a shudder as he did it, and Bucky tried to ignore the pain she unwittingly caused him with her constant, obvious disquiet. The darkness was pulling at him though, goading him, and that gentlemanly soldier boy seemed to be taking a break, or was maybe just too exhausted to stop him as his amused smile turned unflinchingly cruel.

 

Bucky understood Susi’s feelings clearly and sympathetically, because they were an exact mirror of his own. Didn’t mean he had to take it in silence though, even if it wasn’t _gallant_.

 

“You realise I hate this thing, yeah?” Bucky said pointedly, his words coming out a deal harsher than he’d intended.

 

At once, Susi tore her gaze away from the monstrosity of his arm, her cheeks flushing madly with embarrassment. Bucky knew a horrible satisfaction in seeing her so ruffled, and it wasn’t like him. _Steve would hate seeing him like this_. Still, he barrelled on regardless, enjoying his little tirade. He was suddenly so sick of being charming, of keeping himself in check.

 

“And I don’t see why you’ve got such a problem with it, doll. Saved your _virtue_ in the nick o’ time if I remember right?”

 

Bucky’s mind fluttered sickeningly, settling on the night-time blue of his sniper jacket, bringing up the image of the torn dress beneath, the bare, abused, womanly skin. His voice was meaner than he’d ever heard it, his cheeks reddening as Susi opened her mouth indignantly. Without really thinking about it he lifted the metal arm up, extending it along the edge of the cot in a lounging display of casual dominance. The plates whirred gently, settling into the new position. Susi closed her mouth again, tense.

 

“Seems to have more of a moral compass than its creators, maybe more so than me…” Bucky mused absently, staring down at the thing, examining how the mechanics of it interlocked so elegantly. There was a certain pride in his look, and Susi didn’t like it. Her unease grew as Bucky jerked his head back around to glare at her, so unaccountably angry. “If it wasn’t for this _thing_ you’d be going back to your man a broken, bloody _whore_. Guess it can’t be so Goddamn evil after all, huh?”

 

The venomous rage receded quickly in the ringing, shocked silence that ensued, just enough for Bucky to admit regret. He was instantly ashamed, bewildered by his own vitriol. _This ain’t you, Barnes._ Susi’s tense expression had crumpled, tears welling in her eyes as a furious snarl etched itself across her lips. He wanted to beg for her forgiveness, but the damage had been done. When he went to speak, to move to comfort her, she held up a hand, checking him.

 

“Don’t talk to me.” 

 

Susi turned her back resolutely to him, refusing to acknowledge his presence for a full three days straight.

 

_Jesus, Buck, what the hell you gone and done now?_

 

-

 

It was late, but a light still shone from under the agent’s office door.

 

Sonofabitch had been poring over the Austrian files for hours already, but he had absolutely no intention of calling it a night. The Obergruppenführer had demanded expediency in this matter and expediency is what he would have, even if it meant a _week_ of sleepless nights. Watched by a curious technician, the agent placed one of the files flat across his desk, spreading out the blueprints, reports and photographs within and clucking his tongue in thought.

 

“You know, despite being a traitorous little shit, you have to admire Zola’s ingenuity. These designs-” He traced a finger over one of the larger blueprints, fascinated by its intricacy. “-superb.”

 

At the agent’s words the technician gave an indignant snort, placed both hands on his superior’s desk, and glared down menacingly over the tops of his spectacles. Sonofabitch cocked an eyebrow in surprise but didn’t object, amused enough to allow his subordinate some licence.  

 

“That Swiss bastard was a cowardly, back stabbing Judas!” The technician snapped incredulously. “And if you think I’m going to follow his plans for the soldier, you must be out of your mind! My methods have been working so far, _my methods_ , and I refuse to pollute them with Zola’s sorry excuse for-”

 

“I understand your objections,” the agent cut across the technician calmly, threading his fingers beneath his chin and forcing a smirk from overtaking his face. “I really do Dr. Jung, but there it is.” He leaned back in his chair and spread his hands wide in a commiserative gesture. “These are not my orders, you understand? They come from the _highest authority_.”

 

“I do not believe for one moment that the Obergruppenführer would sanction the use of _that man’s_ work!” The technician thumped his fist hard on Sonofabitch’s desk, upsetting the agent’s pot of coffee, but the man was adamant. He scrambled for the blueprint, lifting it up and waving it before the agent’s nose, laughing incredulously. “And a chair like this? You think I can just conjure it out of thin air? I need parts, I need labor, _I need_ _a design that works_! It might not even function properly, it might even destroy the brain of the first man you put in it, it’s-”

 

“Enough!” Sonofabitch rose out of his chair, grabbed the blueprint from Dr. Jung’s grasp and flung it down on the desk between them. Next, he pulled his stun baton from its custom holster and rammed it hard into the technician’s chest, forcing him to take a hasty step back in shock. “I will not argue about this. You have your orders and you will follow them. You will build Zola’s monstrosity, and if I hear _one more word_ from you I will make sure that _you_ are the first man to be strapped into it! Do you understand me, Jung?”  

 

The technician’s eyes had flown wide, his hand coming up to drag the tie away from his neck like it was suddenly choking the air from him.

 

“I, er-”

 

“Excellent!” The agent beamed, reaching out to clap the technician hard on the shoulder, making the man stagger. “You have until the end of the week to put together a prototype. You’re not exactly in the same league as Zola, so I don’t expect perfection.” The technician spluttered, but the agent only grinned wider, his expression verging on the maniacal. “But mark me, Jung, any delays and I will keep my promise. I see no reason why Barnes should be the only leeching _parasite_ to suffer around here.”

 

“Yes. Yes, I, er- I quite agree.” The technician nodded slowly, beginning to back away from the edge of the desk. Pausing, taking a steadying breath, he began collecting the Austrian files from under the agent’s withering gaze. “I shall get started right away, sir. Right away. _Hail Hydra!_ ”

 

“ _Hail Hydra_ , Dr. Jung…”

   

-

 

The agent didn’t come for Bucky that evening, or even the next, or the next...

 

 _That metal slab must be getting real cold_ , Bucky thought sourly to himself.

 

Aside from this welcome reprieve from his punishments, Bucky found he wasn’t taken for his weekly wash, nor was he summoned to his usual appointment with the physician. Nothing happened. No one said a word. No one so much as showed their face at the cell hatch. If it weren’t for the sound of booted feet patrolling the corridor, or the regular appearance of food trays at the cell door, he would have thought the base was abandoned. 

 

This unexplained alteration to his routine was immeasurably troubling to Bucky. His mind teemed with all sorts of possible explanations, growing more numerous and implausible as the hours slogged by. His brain hadn’t been this active for a long while, and he didn’t know whether to find the resulting chatter a comfort or a burden. He almost missed the cleansing balm of the electricity, _almost._ He wondered if this seeming reprieve was some new kind of torture, the point of it to drive him insane as he waited, anxious and on constant tenterhooks.   

 

With Susi remaining intractable and standoffish, there was little he could do by way of distracting himself from his worry. Robbed of familiar – _albeit unpleasant_ – activity, he was forced to lay for long stretches on his cot, flesh arm slung over his eyes to block out the dismal sight of the ceiling, stony and depressingly impenetrable above him.

 

Since falling from the train he had never had so much time to just sit and think. The malaise of it didn’t suit him. He just plain hated feeling so hideously impotent. It was like those real bad months between jobs in Brooklyn, what seemed like a lifetime ago. After getting fired for flapping his big mouth or showing up late again, he’d be confined by necessity to the bland, boring, banality of that three-storey walk up with nothing to do but wallow in his pauper’s misery. It wasn’t so awful if Steve had been canned too, then they could prop each other up somehow, but if he was alone? _Jesus_ , time stretched out like the sun on desert sands. One of the reasons he’d joined the army was to dodge that way of life.   

 

This excess of time let him dwell too much on his wrecked emotions, forcing him to fixate on his gnawing sense of shame for hours at a time. Berating himself off and on, he wished more than anything in the world that he’d been able to control his temper, that he hadn’t let the slide get the better of him. _It just wasn’t in him to talk like that, act like that. Why-_

 

Susi’s complete dismissal of him was only adding to his mounting frustrations. Yet despite his unhappiness in the wake of her reticence he couldn’t bring himself to blame her for it. He’d been a crude, unfeeling _brute_ , and he deserved more than just a cold shoulder. Hell, if he’d heard a guy talking to a lady like that back in the dancehalls of Brooklyn he’d have asked the punk to step outside. He kept replaying the moment he’d snapped such ugly abuse at her, the way she’d cried, and each time he felt as though he recognised himself a little less.  

 

As for Susi, she spent the intervening days pondering how best to deal with her new situation, all the while refusing to acknowledge Bucky’s presence, avoiding his long, pleading stares and restless sighs. His continual attention irked her, making her skin prickle beneath the coarse folds of the borrowed sniper jacket. Glaring down at the filth and grit embedded between the cobblestones, Susi knew she should offer Bucky her forgiveness, that it hadn’t really been _him_ , but it was difficult to acquiesce with the hurt still so raw.

 

By the time the sting of his attack had faded, Susi had to admit that her anger had bloomed more from her own disappointment in him than anything else. She’d believed him stronger, better, but maybe he was just the same as any other broken man? The realisation was a sad one, and it bred disgusted pity in her heart.

 

Trying to sleep at night, she found herself studying Bucky from beneath her lashes, imagining what he might have been like before Hydra’s menace had taken root inside him - before he’d changed _._ She thought he must have been a sweet boy, once, and maybe he still was? The kind of boy you let take your arm in the street, who you brought home to meet your _muter_ , who was cheeky and carefree and kind, and who you danced with sweet and slow to jazz records. That kind of boy would never strike or belittle a woman.

 

_That kind of boy would never make a girl feel like she was worse than nothing._

 

Susi had been called many things during her short life, _whore_ being the least of them, but to hear such a slur come from Bucky’s mouth, thrown out so carelessly by a man who had pledged himself good and moral, caused her to doubt her own worth. The harshness of the word had made Susi feel as though her torn dress could never be mended, that it would remain an emblematic part of her, marking her out as damaged goods for all to see and judge. She kept trying to remind herself that Bucky _mustn’t_ have meant it, that he was a decent man beneath the wreckage, but still, his insult had conjured up the feel of hands grabbing her, twisting her, making her feel _wrong_. While Bucky had never touched her with intent, in that brash, uncontrolled moment of spitefulness he had succeeded in degrading her.

 

It wasn’t until the evening of the third day that Susi finally consented to speak to Bucky again, and when she did it began as purely practical.

 

As a way of showing his penance, Bucky had been refusing to touch the food trays brought to them each morning and night, nudging them over to her side of the cell by way of abject apology. She’d eaten these offerings at first, channelling her fury into devouring everything he put in front of her. However, as the days stretched on and Bucky continued to starve himself, Susi found her anger decreasing into begrudging worry.

 

“You look pale, Sergeant,” she snapped at last, as Bucky made to kick their evening meal over to her for the third time in a row.

 

Bucky jerked his head up at once, a hopeful smile tugging at his worn and weary face. It was like the sound of her voice was a catalyst for joy, a fact she found both disturbing and flattering by turns. It made her uncomfortable, shook up her conviction to hate him. Susi’s hardened heart simply couldn’t help but melt slightly at the sight of Bucky’s boyish smile, her innate sympathy for him beginning to smother the tremendous hurt he’d caused.

 

Deciding to be charitable, Susi folded her arms across her chest and raised her eyebrows in a challenge, glaring pointedly at the lumpy porridge on the tray between them.

 

“Eat it,” she said, feigning sternness. “I’m sick of hearing your stomach turn at night.”       

 

Bucky paused as though deliberating, then shrugged with a soft, put-upon sigh. The warmth had already spread throughout his belly in anticipation, desperate for a reprieve from the near-constant hunger pangs.  

 

“Yes, M’am.”

 

Moving back to his cot Bucky began to eat as inconspicuously as possible, not wanting to annoy her in her newfound tenderness. It was awkward, scooping the food into his mouth with his flesh fingers, hand trembling from lack of sustenance. Some of the porridge fell to the cell floor in the process, ruined, though he found it difficult to care. He was just glad Susi was taking notice of him again, because being ignored by her so completely had begun to feel like not existing at all – _and he’d kinda liked that._

It worried Bucky just how little he’d minded not eating, even with the rising shakes and underlying nausea. A small but growing part of him had hoped, maybe, that if he’d held out long enough he’d have been allowed to slip away, to leave that blasted place of his own volition once and for all. Now _that_ was something Steve would never have approved of, that stubborn, scrappy guy that detested the very _idea_ of giving in, of ceding control to some higher power.  

 

When he was finished Bucky set the empty tray back on the floor between them, wiping his flesh hand against the leg of his cargo pants. He waited a beat, but Susi didn’t react.

 

“Thank you, M’am,” Bucky inclined his head in Susi’s direction, wanting her to look at him. It hurt a lot more than he cared to admit when she didn’t meet his eyes. _Gosh, he hated this._ Taking a loud, despairing breath, Bucky clenched the fingers of his metal hand in readiness, and managed to gasp out, “You know doll, I’m so s-”

 

But he didn’t get to finish, because it was then, _finally_ , that he heard the agents coming for him.

 

Boots in the corridor, the jangle of keys, the low mutter of orders echoing off the reinforced concrete - and something buried deep in Bucky just knew, instinctively, that _this time_ was going to be different. He knew, somehow, that coming back from wherever Hydra was about to lead him would be the devil’s own road. They had made him wait, made him sweat it out, riled him up until he was damn near crazy with the suspense, and now it was time for the cat o’ nine tails to reach out of the darkness and flay him open.

 

The fear that jumped up in his chest was visceral, startling, and as the sensation went to throttle his throat he cast his gaze wildly about the room, _wanting Steve,_ but finding only Susi. The panicked expression on her face did nothing to calm him. There was nothing for it, he knew, he’d just have to take whatever came and be damned.

 

“Do you forgive me?” Bucky murmured urgently to her, standing to attention as the lock on the cell door was drawn back. Susi stared at him blankly, not comprehending. “Do you?” he hissed again. “Darlin’, please?”

 

Susi could only nod dumbly as the cell door swung open, fearful regret settling into the very core of her as the Sergeant was taken away.    

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies, this took a lot longer than I expected to turn around! I ended up writing much more than I originally intended, so I've had to split this chapter or it would easily have been 10k+ (another update coming sometime next week). Thank you all for reading.
> 
> -
> 
>  _verboten_ = forbidden (German)  
>  _muter_ = mother (Yiddish)
> 
> [As usual, I have tried to use phrases from different languages for atmosphere. I apologise if I have used them incorrectly and welcome corrections!]


	4. Forgetting Steve Rogers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those here for the Bucky/Steve plot line, this chapter is your goldmine. It's also about three times as long as I originally intended, because once I started writing the memory sections I got a little carried away... 
> 
> Also, keep your eye out for a URL embedded in the '1935' section, which links to the swing music referred to by Bucky. I thought it might be fun to add as much period detail as possible, so I'd recommend listening to it to set the mood. 
> 
> Warning: This chapter features some difficult themes such as period-specific homophobia and emotional manipulation/physical torture. There be dragons.

Entering the lab and seeing the chair where the table should have been, Bucky wondered if he’d stopped breathing, his eyes clouding over with a swift, marring terror. His throat went dry, his mouth turned sour, and for a split-second it was like he was swimming through the air above the floor, completely weightless. He felt as though he could’ve reached up and hit the ceiling had two guards not been holding him down, one gripping his flesh wrist while the other pinched the skin hard at the back of his neck, carefully avoiding the metal grafted to his left shoulder. Together they pushed at the small of his back, trying to drive him forwards into the lab, but Bucky dragged his feet, resisting.

 

While he was prepared to die, he didn’t think he had the courage to suffer death by electric chair. He’d heard too many stories of convicts on death row; their final moments spent blindfolded and bound, jolting so hard against the current that their bones dislocated or fractured in their restraints, their skin swelling and smoking, the stench of their own burning bodies filling their nostrils as they shat, pissed and screamed their way into oblivion.

 

 _Jesus_ , he couldn’t go, _not like that_.

 

Please _, not like that._

 

“Now, Sergeant Barnes, you aren’t scared are you?”

 

Sonofabitch’s voice rang out clear and patronising from the control box to Bucky’s right, and Bucky’s body responded automatically. His muscles clenched from the tips of his toes to the instinctually defiant jut of his chin, and he hated how it allowed the guards to drag him that much easier into the lab, like a smooth pillar of stone suspended between them.

 

Bucky couldn’t stop staring at the chair, even as the Hydra agent stepped out into the lab at large and began pacing the tiles towards him. He didn’t stop staring at it until Sonofabitch was right in front of him, blocking his view.

 

“Care to share your thoughts with the rest of the group, soldier?” The agent asked, smirking as he reached up to grasp Bucky’s chin roughly between forefinger and thumb. He leant in conspiratorially, until Bucky balked at the man’s rank breath on his cheek. The agent grinned, murmuring into Bucky’s skin, “You know, they may be the last thoughts you ever have?”

 

Their eyes met in a wordless challenge; Bucky’s glacial blue boring into the agent’s hollow, depthless black and Bucky was so captivated by them that he didn’t see the stun baton until it was shoved hard against his abdomen. White hot agony ripped through his solar plexus, tearing his breath away so violently that he sagged in the guards’ hold, knees giving out from under him.  

 

“Strap him down, _schnell!_ ”

 

Bucky recognised the intent behind the barked order, even as the nettling buzz of the electric shocks forced his limbs to remain immobile, his brain alert but operating through a haze of debilitating pain. Desperate to fight them all off, to preserve his mind and his dignity, degradation hit hard as he found there was absolutely nothing his wrecked body could do but allow itself to be led. The humiliation rose like so much bile in his stomach as they pushed him to sit, grasping at his arms and legs to still the shakes as they buckled and tautened the chair’s restraints around him. There was simply no escaping the clinical efficiency of their actions, and all Bucky could do was hang his head, pray, and wait for the life to be strung out of him by the agent’s command.

 

Except that the command never came.

 

Instead, he felt a soft pressure on his flesh shoulder, squeezing gently to get his attention. The touch was almost tender, and Bucky might have liked it if it weren’t accompanied by the butcher’s smell of bloodied leather and a rough, male odour. Still pressing his palm against Bucky’s shoulder, the agent pushed a gloved hand through the Sergeant’s hair – _petting him_.

 

Bucky snarled, making to shake his head free but the agent held on tighter, laughing.

 

“Barnes, you’re a real marvel.” The agent said heartily, continuing to paw at Bucky’s hair, knowing just how much it was making the soldier want to squirm and recoil in the chair’s restraints. “When you first came to me, I thought you’d be dead within a week. You should have seen yourself, so completely ripped apart, abandoned by your comrades, a sniveling wreck of a man…”

 

“Just get on with it,” Bucky interrupted through gritted teeth, flesh fingers biting into the arm of the chair while his metal fist refused to move. Steeling himself, he tried to push the horror of what was about to happen to him firmly to the back of his mind, wanting to keep his nerve before singing for Saint Peter. “I mean it. I’d rather die than listen to your blather for one more second.”

 

“Die?” The agent’s fingers slid from Bucky’s scalp to his left shoulder, beginning to run the tips of them smoothly along the raised, red skin joining the machinery to Bucky’s body. Bucky’s jaw tightened reflexively, discomforted by the intrusion of his personal space. Sonofabitch’s gaze was reverent, even as his words betrayed a cunning, all-powerful arrogance. “I don’t think so Sergeant Barnes. Not today. We have far more important things to discuss than your pathetic desire for Heaven.”

 

Then he was off, striding away from Bucky with a purposeful spring in his goosestep that put the soldier ill at ease. Bucky watched him, dumbfounded. _What was this chair for if not to put an end to him?_ Bucky narrowed his eyes, distrust swelling in his chest. The metal fingers twitched in response, and Bucky’s heart beat all the faster for it. He wished he had a cross to kiss.

 

Waiting on tenterhooks for several long moments, Bucky used the time to survey the rest of the lab. It looked very much like it always did, though with small differences you’d only really notice if you knew a place well. The chair, obviously, was a major break from tradition, as was the myriad equipment surrounding it. As of yet, this equipment had no discernible purpose to him, though by inspecting a tray of instruments close at hand, Bucky saw the mouth guard they usually employed to protect his teeth during electric shock therapy remained prominent. Beside that there was also a number of syringes, accompanied by small capsules containing a mixture of blue and clear solutions. He didn’t feel particularly inclined to discover the use of these things, though a small shred of Bucky began to calm at the realization that whatever this chair was for, it didn’t seem to be designed to kill him. _Not yet, anyway._      

 

When Sonofabitch returned from the control box he held a thick manila file in his gloved hand, waving it ostentatiously before smacking it down against his open palm. Stopping in front of the bound soldier, the agent adopted a wide stance and bit at his lower lip. He looked deliberately pensive, as though pondering on whether to deliver bad news to a close friend, but Bucky wasn’t fooled. He prepared himself for the worst, but was still non-the-wiser when the question came.

 

“Tell me, Barnes, have you ever loved anyone else as much as you love Steve Rogers?” 

 

Then the agent opened the file, began talking, and white noise descended on Bucky like a weighty, all-consuming mantle of driving snow.

 

-

 

_(1936)_

 

Bucky knew that loving his best friend was wrong.

 

It was vile and unnatural thinking for a good Catholic boy like him, who’d been brought up in the church under the reproachful eyes of the Virgin. It wasn’t becoming behaviour for a lad who was so winning with the ladies, who was capable of being a flirt without slipping into being a cad, and who all the mothers in the neighbourhood were hoping to snag for their daughters. If only it weren’t for that Rogers kid, hanging around Bucky’s neck like a millstone, who he’d snub any girl in a heartbeat for. Gosh, did he get scolded for that, but he couldn’t help it. It was instinctual. He knew he shoulda left Steve alone the moment their innocent rough-housing had turned into something heated and confusing, something that kept him up at night, giving himself over to guilty pleasures and murmured cussing. He prayed to God that his sisters never heard him. At least he’d moved out now, finally. He understood in his very soul that taking Steve in after Mrs Rogers’ had died had been a duplicitous act, mulled over by Brooklyn gossips, branded sinful because it was motivated by curious greed just as much as seeming charity and compassion.

 

He got all of that, _really_ , he did.  

 

Bucky knew it made him a sinner to think the things he did, but how was he supposed to stop thinking them when Steve had always loomed so large in Bucky’s life, immovable and full of such attractive guile? Just how was Bucky meant to turn the simmer down, when Steve was forever sticking his big schnoz into each and every sorry pile o’ trouble that came his way? It was simply too difficult for Bucky to deny his feelings when Steve forced him to confront them with his fists, dragging him in whenever he got himself into a scrape and needed someone to bail him out, to mop up the blood, to put an arm around his skinny shoulders and smile big and conspiratorial like-

 

“You’re a punk, Rogers!” Bucky snarled, half-annoyed, half-exasperated as he clipped Steve upside the head. They were exiting the alleyway behind Farrell’s bar, groans of pain and wounded pride following close on their heels. Bucky just wanted to get outta there before the bastards gave chase. They needed to lose themselves in the Saturday night crowd. Scooping Steve against his side, ignoring the kid’s squawk of disapproval, Bucky steered them a few blocks before really getting started on his ticking-off. “That was three against one, pal. Did you really think you were gonna walk away from that?”

 

“I had ’em on the ropes.”

 

“Sure you did.”

 

Their usual banter had a hard edge tonight, and far from removing the tension it only seemed to ramp it up to even greater heights. Steve sniffed the air defiantly as he wriggled out from under Bucky’s protective arm, baring his teeth in a winsome grin. The fierce orange of the streetlights beaming overhead made him look like a grizzly caricature of himself, all shadows and pinkish, beat up skin. Bucky’s heart pounded that much harder when he noticed Steve’s front tooth was newly chipped. He rolled his eyes skyward, praying to the Almighty for the _strength_ to deal with this like an adult, even as he wanted to rub Steve’s face in the Goddamn dirt. 

 

“Rogers, it’s like talking to a brick wall through a layer of solid concrete, trying to make you see sense.”

 

Bucky huffed angrily, looking down at his bruised, stinging knuckles. They too looked like something out of a comic book, the wounds garish and stinging like the devil himself had put them there. The skin had torn a little against the jaw of the biggest mook, but it was nothing compared to the purple shiner coming up under Steve’s left eye, or the twisted ankle he was carrying bravely yet still trying to hide.

 

_Well, who the fuck did he think he was kidding?_

 

Bucky flung out an arm, catching Steve in the chest. They stopped walking abruptly in the dusky twilight, and Steve just stood there with his hands in his pockets, looking all innocent like butter wouldn’t melt in his smart mouth, like he hadn’t just picked a fight with a pack of thugs over a casual insult in a game of pool. Bucky pushed his tongue into the side of his cheek, shook his head in goaded disbelief and – _yep, he’d had enough_ – suddenly, Steve found himself hoisted up and hanging over Bucky’s shoulder.

 

“Let me down, you jerk!” Steve snarled, struggling like a feral cat even as he winced with every aborted twist and pummel of his fists against Bucky’s broad back. It felt like the hammering of small stones to Bucky, who merely hefted Steve more securely and strode off down the pavement.  

 

“What kinda fella makes a bust-up kid walk?” Bucky hooted, loud and brash enough to attract the attention of half the avenue.

 

People stared and tutted at the two ne’er-do-wells, clearly fresh from a brawl, making a scene on the public street. Some glowered in outright disapproval, while a good few jeered, enjoying the show of this scrawny guy throwing a temper tantrum as he was lugged along by a man twice his size, weight and stamina.

 

“I can walk just fine, pal, I ain’t hurt! _Jesus_ , Buck, people are looking-”

 

“Don’t care, I’m a regular gent. Treatin’ you _nice_ after the shock you just had.”

 

“Come on Buck, what’s the deal here?!”

 

Steve was squirming so determinedly in his grip that Bucky had to wrap his arms tight around the kid’s swinging legs to avoid getting kicked in the balls. _Like he hadn’t had enough of that already today_. Grinning, Bucky made a point of barrelling through a group of dolled-up gals, clearly on their way to the dancehall, and as they caught sight of the boys’ tableau they erupted into fits of giggles. Steve saw red at that.

 

“You got some real nerve, Buck! I ain’t some blasted toddler!”

 

“Come off it, punk. You’re acting like a child, so you’re being treated like a child!” Bucky whistled, letting his words carry high and stern, just enough to inform every passer-by of Steve’s failing and the predicament he’d gotten himself into because of it. “And what happens to kids when they misbehave? They get carried home by their da and given a damn good hiding. What d’yer say pal, you like the sound o’ that?”           

 

“Hell no I don’t – put me down! Buck! _Bucky_!”

 

In despite of all provocation, Bucky refused to set Steve square on his feet again until they were back at their three-storey walk up, which they’d left a scanty two hours earlier for a quiet night at the beer den. A good, solid time – _that’s what he’d been promised_ – all ruined by Steve’s unique talent for attracting the wrong sort of attention from badmouthed scumbags.

 

With Steve still slung over his shoulder – albeit, struggling a mite less now they were alone – Bucky carried him over the threshold of their shared apartment and dumped him unceremoniously down on the sofa, making the springs screech in protest.

 

When Steve immediately made to get up, face beet-red with humiliation, Bucky was there, up in his space, forcing Steve back down with a hard look and a jab of his pointer finger.

 

“Now _listen_ -” Bucky began, his voice as unyielding as his stance. It was the kinda tone that you didn’t ignore, not if you knew what was good for you.

 

Steve, obviously, never knew what was good for him.

 

“You think that was funny? What the hell, Buck?” Steve’s blue eyes were flashing in his thin face, and Bucky thought he heard the man’s chest beginning to rattle. That cooled his ire a little. _Maybe this hadn’t been the best idea after all._ The colour was high on Steve’s cheeks and his neck flushed as he stared Bucky down. “I’m already a laughing stock around these parts, you don’t gotta chastise me in front of the whole goddamn neighbourhood!” 

 

“Oh, I don’t?” Bucky reached out, grabbed Steve’s chin and turned his face into the light, inspecting his new wealth of cuts and bruises and seeing how they overlapped with older, half-healed scrapes. Steve tugged his head away, grimacing under Bucky’s scrutiny. “Third time in two weeks I’ve had to haul your ass out of a fight you couldn’t’ve won in a month of Sundays, and you don’t need chastising?”  

 

Not answering immediately, Steve folded his arms across his skinny chest and lounged back against the sofa cushions, spreading his legs wide, obnoxious in his directionless fury. He was tapping his right foot in a nervous staccato against the bare boards of the floor, his head cocked rigidly to the side, the angle making his outsized ears look even more like ridiculous saucers. He was scowling at Bucky like he wanted to put a bullet in him.

 

“Just ’cause I’m smaller than you, don’t mean you’ve got the right to show me up like that. You can make a point without hefting me along like a sack of potatoes.”

 

Steve sniffed defiantly yet again, wiping his hand under his nose, taking away a streak of dried blood. The sight of the red marking Steve’s skin made Bucky want to flip out and bust up some of their more meagre furniture, because it was _his job_ to make sure this sorta thing didn’t happen, and he’d failed – again – _because Steve was a stubborn asshole._

“Oh I can, can I? Well shucks, Steve, I’ve tried everything else!”

 

Steve rolled his eyes to the ceiling but refused to acknowledge the statement, gnawing his lower lip in a forced, mulish smile. He was shaking his head from side to side, breathing heavily, and Bucky knew that he was pretending not to feel chagrined by the truth of Bucky’s words. Because yeah, Bucky had been trying to set Steve straight ever since elementary school, and nothing, not a single solitary thing, had worked. There seemed to be nothing on the planet capable of stemming Steve’ pig-headed denial that things were the way they were, and that little guys couldn’t hold their own in a fight against three unless they were frickin’ ninjas.

 

Keeping determinedly calm, Bucky spoke in slow, measured tones, trying to stop the growing heat of exasperation from bleeding into his speech.

 

“How many times do I have to tell you? I don’t care if you’re 6 feet tall or 5 inches small, I will always help you out when that mouth of yours gets you into trouble. All’s I’m saying is, you gotta stop that damn chip on your shoulder from pushing you into doing so much stupid shit.”

 

Hunkering down on his haunches before the sofa, Bucky tried to get on Steve’s level, to connect with him, but Steve was too wound up to let him. It always made Bucky’s chest ache, the times when Steve became unreachable, sullen and sad. Biting back a sigh, he decided to gentle his approach. He put a steadying hand on Steve’s knee, tapping it to get the brunt of Steve’s attention.

 

“You can’t go in swinging every time, Stevie, you know that ain’t what being a man is all about.”  

 

“And what do I know about being a man, huh Buck?” Steve replied without missing a beat, throwing his hands up in the air in a self-deprecating arc. His temper was still sharp, but his expression had turned a new kind of world weary. “Regular guys don’t have to prove themselves a tenth as much as I do. Hell, you don’t know how lucky you are.”

 

Rocking back on his heels Bucky frowned, affronted.

 

“Don’t be a schmuck, Rogers. What kinda self-pitying bullshit is this?”

 

Deep down though, beneath that front of bravado, Bucky understood full-well what Steve was driving at.

 

It had been under the surface of their relationship their entire lives, right from that first moment, when Bucky had stopped a pair of schoolyard bullies from stealing Steve’s lunch money. The fact of the matter was, Steve just wasn’t that strong or bulky, and never would be. Steve’s stunted growth was probably due to his being sick as a dog for four months out of the year, and it made people treat him oddly, belittlingly. He always looked like he hadn’t quite grown into his own skin, like he was a perpetual pubescent boy walking around in his father’s old clothes. _He was a regular Pinocchio._ Bucky on the other hand, being an athletic, brawny overachiever with a nice smile and kind eyes, just seemed to get all the breaks Steve could never take a hold of.

 

The dynamic between them had always been lopsided as a result of this physical inequality, with Bucky playing the part of the all-providing male, ready to step in if things went south. As for Steve, well, he could talk big and strike his chest all he wanted, he’d still look as pretty as a girl in her first flush. As Steve got older, the sting of that barb seemed to be getting harder for him to handle and Bucky didn’t know what to say to make it hurt any less.

 

 _Hell, you couldn’t change fate._   

 

Another truth that was undeniable, however, was that Bucky couldn’t care less if people thought Steve was manly. Bucky had loved him all these years because he was _Stevie_ , plain and simple, nothing more. So what if his puny arms couldn’t fill out a jacket? He was still a firecracker. Saying that to Steve’s face though, it just never came out right.   

 

“You’re a real piece, Rogers.” Bucky sighed eventually, bringing his big hand up to settle fondly on the side of Steve’s bruised neck. The skin there was soft as a babe’s cheek, like it’d never felt the scrape of a razor. Bucky always wondered at it, letting his thumb stroke along Steve’s pointed jaw in unconscious fascination. How Steve couldn’t appreciate his own vulpine good looks, Bucky never knew. “I don’t get why you always gotta fight so hard for something that don’t make a lick o’ difference, pal, I really don’t. You’re the kinda gorgeous any ordinary man would kill to be. You make me jealous, just you being you, every Goddamn day.”   

 

Steve flinched under his touch and Bucky stiffened. His heart skipped a beat. _Shit_ , he hadn’t meant-

 

The atmosphere in the room shifted abruptly in the wake of Bucky’s unguarded declaration – breathing a kind of sense into something that hadn’t felt right for a real long time. They both felt it, and suddenly Bucky couldn’t tear his eyes away from Steve. A freezing bucket of fear had been dumped into the pit of his stomach, because Steve was gazing at him in a way that surely couldn’t bode well. It was a steely, concentrated look, bringing his brows tightknit together and turning his mouth down at the edges. It was like staring into the face of a stranger, and Bucky knew he should probably drop his hand from Steve’s neck but everything was ice, even the blood in his veins. He just waited, terrified beneath a veneer of calm. Maybe if he didn’t let the familiar mask slip he could get past this peculiar sinking feeling, maybe Steve would let the whole thing lie. 

 

_Fat chance. Who’d he think he was talking to?_

“Gorgeous, huh? You really believe that?” Steve mused, placing his elbows on his knees and clutching his hands together in the space between. He leant forward off the sofa a fraction, just a little menacing with his black eye and cut mouth, and Bucky found he still couldn’t dislodge his hand from that spot beneath Steve’s ear. The flesh of his palm smarted. Following the point of Steve’s tongue as it flicked out, Bucky watched in agony as the man licked at the blood smudged above his top lip. Then Steve’s baby blues turned all kinds of challenging, and he smirked as he said, “Prove it.” 

 

-

 

“I don’t believe you!” Bucky shouted angrily, glaring daggers into Sonofabitch’s gloating, sneering countenance, too close to him, invading his space. There was nowhere to go in the chair, leaving Bucky cornered and furious, “Not a Goddamn word of it. He’d never do anything that fucking stupid!”

 

“No?” Sonofabitch raised his eyebrows, revelling in Bucky’s obstinate disbelief, in the pain he glimpsed running white hot beneath the surface. His arms bracketed Bucky on either side, and he was leaning down, nose to nose with Bucky and drinking in every twitch and shudder the view afforded him. It was like playing with a mouse in a maze. “The good, _honourable_ Captain America wouldn’t crash a bomb-laden plane that was on a collision course with New York City? He wouldn’t do whatever was necessary to save countless civilian lives?”

 

Bucky thought about that. He thought about it for the shortest, most dismissive amount of time that was physically possible in his aching head, then he reared back in the chair’s restraints, hocked, and spat in the agent’s face. Retribution was swift, the stun baton jabbing hard against his stomach and for a moment he seized up, back rigid, gritting his teeth and tasting blood through the static. He wasn’t sorry. The satisfaction of defiance made every second of pain worth it.

 

In the panting, sweltering silence that followed, Bucky counted his heartbeats until they returned to normal and tongued at the cuts inside his mouth and _did not think_ about what could be the truth, what might really have happened. No. _But-_ No, no, _no_ , it was all lies and deception and just another sick, sordid, twisted tactic to crawl under Bucky’s skin. He knew how the agent worked, he refused to be deluded. Steve was reckless, sure, but he wasn’t, he wasn’t-

 

“Trust me, Barnes, your boyfriend froze to death _months ago_ in the Arctic tundra. But don’t worry, I’m sure he thought of you as he was slowly _consumed_ by frostbite. Though _wait_ , maybe he went up in flames and was burned alive? Trapped and _helpless_ in the wreck of the Valkyrie, calling out for you to save-”

 

“Stop it!”

 

Then there was the swift fluttering of paper, and suddenly Bucky was confronted by a flurry of newsprint, tens of ragged pages littering the floor at his feet. Steve’s determined, stubborn, battle-ready face peered up at Bucky from every single one of them. The words blurred and refocused as he scanned them distrustfully, all proclaiming heroism, sacrifice, a loss to the nation, a bright future built upon a terrible injustice of fate. It was all there, Bucky realised, blinking down at the grainy, back-dated truth set out for him so heartlessly in black and white. It all seemed so horridly _plausible_.

 

“There is no salvation to be found in denial, soldier.”

 

The agent was speaking softly to him now, almost lovingly, pacing back and forth before the chair, stepping over the mess of scattered newspapers. His boots left dirty marks across Steve’s photograph. Bucky was still trying to remember how to breathe when the agent moved a hand to the back of the soldier’s neck, rubbing circles like you would to placate a skittish horse ready to bolt from the harness. Bucky sucked air through flared nostrils, limbs wracked with something chilling, ignoring the scorching heat welling up behind his eyes, because letting tears fall would mean so much more than defeat. _It would mean the end._

 

“It isn’t-” Bucky heard his own voice crack for the first time, wavering as the agent continued to stroke at the skin beneath his hairline, offering a weak, perverse kind of comfort even as he was the one to let the axe fall. “It isn’t true. He wouldn’t-”

 

“What wouldn’t he do, Sergeant Barnes?” Sonofabitch murmured warm and sympathetic against the shell of Bucky’s ear. Somewhere behind him the agent knew Dr. Jung was arranging the magnetic tape machine, getting it ready to deliver the final blow.

 

 _Thanks be to the_ _Führer that they’d been able to intercept that radio transmission._

 

“He-” Bucky gulped, and the heat in his face was becoming more and more difficult to marshal. He could feel the wetness beginning to spill, felt it building behind his eyes and at the back of his nose and throat. When he met the agent’s gaze, saw the loathsome compassion mixed with triumph, Bucky said what could never be taken back. “He wouldn’t leave me.”

 

There was a long, tense silence in the lab. The agent was smiling wide, his thumb pressing into the hollow behind Bucky’s ear, holding his trembling head steady. Bucky wanted to snatch the confession from the air, cram it back down deep inside him where it belonged in that secret, private place he’d never let Hydra see. The chair was impossibly solid beneath him, its straps rough and abrasive against his flesh, and his mounting awareness of its hold on him made Bucky tremble all the harder, made him shake. The agent felt it, suppressing a righteous chuckle. He understood.

 

The agent signalled behind him, still staring down at Bucky’s quivering, lost expression as he said, “Play it, Jung. He needs to hear it.”

 

With the resounding click of a button the magnetic tape machine whirred to life, filling the lab with an echoing crackle, its wheels spinning hypnotically, drawing Bucky’s unwilling eye. For a fractional, blissful moment, he didn’t know what was about to happen. Then there was Steve’s unmistakable voice, sounding like it was coming from a thousand miles away, breaking and filled with an unfamiliar, defeated cadence. The determination lying heavy beneath the defeat was clear as a claxon, even through the murk of the recording.

 

_“There’s not gonna be a safe landing... But I can try and force it down.”_

_“I’ll get Howard on the line, he’ll know what to do-”_

_“There’s not enough time! This thing’s moving too fast and it’s heading for New York… I gotta put her in the water.”_

_“Please, don’t do this. We have time. We can work it out!”_

_“Right now I’m in the middle of nowhere. If I wait any longer a lot of people are gonna die… Peggy, this is my choice.”_

Bucky thought he might hyperventilate, because this couldn’t be real and if it was real then Hell, he didn’t want to exist. He couldn’t be about to hear the death of the man he loved, who he had _always_ loved-

_“Peggy?”_

_“I’m here…”_

_“I’m gonna need a rain check on that dance.”_

_“Alright. A week next Saturday at the Stork Club.”_

_“You got it.”_

_“Eight o’clock on the dot. Don’t you dare be late! Understood?”_

_“You know, I still don’t know how to dance…”_

_“I’ll show you how. Just be there.”_

_“We’ll have the band play something slow… I’d hate to step on your-”_

Then there was nothing, just the crackle of a line gone dead and the pitiful sobbing of a woman Bucky had never liked much, always bitterly resented, but right then he felt an awful kinship with her in despite of past differences. He cried with Peggy Carter, the tears running hot and seemingly never-ending down his cheeks. Because Steve Rogers was missing in action, and Bucky Barnes was suddenly more alone than he had ever been before.

    

-

 

_(1935)_

“Keep your head up, punk. You can’t expect to make eyes at a lady when you’re staring at your feet!”

 

Bucky’s finger chucked under Steve’s pointed chin, forcing his friend’s face up before returning his hand to rest atop Steve’s shoulder. It felt damn strange playing the part of the follow, but if Steve wanted to learn how to lead then Bucky guessed he could play the dame. _Just this once_. The strains of the [Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and Edythe Wright](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mj73yYe3AY8) were blaring rhythmically from the record player sat on the kitchen cabinet, making Bucky’s body sway with impatience. His natural instinct to grab a gal’s waist and whip about the floor was difficult to pin down, but he knew Steve would thump him if he even _tried it_ …

 

Steve was looking all kinds of frustrated, like he always did just before he lost his temper and let his fists wail. Bucky didn’t mind though, in fact he kinda liked it. He could handle the eventuality of Steve Rogers pitching a fit, so long as he learned how to triple-step in the process. And if Bucky got the opportunity to waltz about with Steve pressed tight against him into the bargain, then all the sweeter.

 

_Jesus, did he ever live for such guilty pleasures as these..._

 

“Easy for you to say, Buck, you got this. How am I supposed to keep from treading on a gal’s toes if I don’t look down?” Steve whined, shying his head away as Bucky tried forcing his gaze up again with a clip around the ear.   

 

“You practice! Ain’t I been telling you that?” Bucky rolled his eyes with long suffering patience, then sighed as he examined the limp way their hands joined. He let his eyes drift down to the splayed stance of Steve’s too flat feet and tutted. “And where the hell is your frame? If you tried spinning me out with a frame as bad as that you’d fall flat on your ass trying to catch me!”

 

“I’d fall flat on my ass no matter how good my frame was,” Steve protested, staring challengingly up into Bucky’s hot stare, smirking that smirk that had begun to haunt Bucky’s dreams of late. “You’re built like a brick shit house, Barnes.”  

 

It wasn’t an exaggeration. With the two of them pressed close like this, just in their slacks and shirtsleeves, it was too damn apparent just how ill-matched they were as dancing partners. While Bucky was at least a head taller than Steve, broad-shouldered and blessed with a toned, muscular physique built up by boxing at the YMCA, Steve was dwarfed and weedy, weak-kneed and pigeon-breasted.

 

“That’s not the point, it ain’t the look of the thing that’s important!” Bucky responded in exasperation, reaching for Steve’s hand where is lay soft on his hip and jerking it up to settle more firmly on his side. He raised both eyebrows at Steve’s mocking snort and huffed, “It’s all about how you hold me, Rogers, how you guide me about. If you ain’t got conviction behind it, of course you’re gonna step on toes and fail to block a spin. So I repeat, keep your frame solid, _jackass_.”

 

“I still maintain that this would be much easier with a dame,” Steve muttered petulantly, though he held Bucky as instructed, tightly cradling Bucky’s lower back, his left hand gripping Bucky’s open palm. He tried straightening his crooked spine a little more, wanting to anchor his feet more securely to the bare boards of the kitchen floor. His ma had just scrubbed it before leaving for her shift at the hospital, and it felt a mite more slippery than was strictly comfortable.

 

“And I maintain that if you can learn to steer someone as big as _me_ around without tripping over yourself, a mere slip of a girl should be no problem. But hey, if it makes you uncomfortable, pretend I’m some homely waif straight out of a Red Hook tenement.”

 

“Hey! You say that like I couldn’t get a fancy lookin’ dame, when you know I’m real good at puttin’ on the charm.” Steve groused, firming his lips up into what he imagined to be a coquettish smile. “Say Honey, can I get you a ginger ale?”

 

“Oh yeah, you’re a regular Clarke Gable.” Bucky teased good-naturedly, grinning like a wolf in return. “Makes me swoon just looking at you, kid. Now, we gonna practice the eight-count or are you gonna walk me home to my momma?”

 

Bucky’s ludicrous banter was doing a fine job of relaxing Steve, who never really enjoyed being this close to anyone, let alone with so much touching. It always made him feel as though he were being scrutinised, sized up, and found wanting. Bucky was the only person in the whole world who never made him feel like that. So, in despite of all Steve’s complaining, he was secretly pretty happy that Bucky was the one teaching him how to swing.  

 

It wasn’t that he was _completely_ useless when it came to dancing, Steve just lacked a lot of the grace and finesse that got the girl’s interested for more. He could manage a slow, meandering box-step whenever Bucky dragged him along to one of the church socials, but a couple of turns was usually about all it took before his unlucky partner would tire, sometimes smiling patiently and apologetically or sometimes just walking off without a backwards glance. These were muted affairs though, with chaperones, chequered tablecloths and root beers. The chaotic atmosphere promised by Bucky’s new jazz records spoke of smoky clubs and packed halls, built solely for the purpose of raucous, mature enjoyment, of fast steps, swirling skirts and high heels. Steve wanted more than anything to be a part of that world, _Bucky’s world._ And what’s more, he didn’t wanna look like a _putz_ trippin’ over himself in a room full of twirling, jiving demons.

 

“Not bad Rogers,” Bucky complimented in a falsely light air, letting Steve manoeuvre them around the kitchen table for the fourth time. He wasn’t strictly lying, though Steve’s hesitancy over every step was making him bite his tongue so hard he thought it might bleed. “But you could do with picking up the pace a little, this eight-count is turning into something irregular. Also, try spinning me out on the next pass-”

 

“I ain’t doing that, you’ll break something!”

 

“Like hell I will! I, unlike _you_ , have an elegant way about me. I, unlike _you_ , do _not_ break things.”

 

They both knew he was stretching the truth. Many a time had Bucky been called a bull in a china shop. Still, Steve was feeling confident, so when it came to giving the table a fifth pass he screwed up his nerve and swung Bucky out. It didn’t surprise either of them very much when Steve’s weak grip caused Bucky to lose his balance and careen headlong into the door. What did surprise them was how much such a mistake could hurt. Flailing wildly, Bucky smacked his temple against the hard wood, one of his arms flinging upwards and bringing half a shelf of pans down on top of his head. The clanging of metal and Bucky’s strangled yell had Mrs Collins banging angrily on the ceiling with the butt of her broom, shouting at them to: _For Goodness sake keep it down!_

 

“Aw hell, Bucky, you alright?” Steve hurried forwards to extricate his friend from the mess he’d made, desperately sorry – not to mention hideously embarrassed. 

 

Thinking he might be a tad concussed, Bucky tried not to make a big deal out of it as Steve attempted to pull him up. His head was swimming. Of course, Steve being Steve, all he succeeded in doing was toppling down right over Bucky as he failed to support his friend’s weight. Landing badly, he elbowed Bucky in the stomach. Doubling up, Bucky wheezed and groaned as Steve’s face flamed, red flushing right to the tips of his ears.

 

“Jesus Christ, Stevie, if this is how you treat a lady-”

 

“Shut up, jerk! I fucking _told you_ that would happen!”

 

The needle had begun to slip across the grooves of the swing record, most likely jolted by the reverberating force of Bucky’s fall. The result was an eerie, disjointed blur of melded sound, the instruments of the orchestra and the jaunty voices of Dorsey and Wright sailing discordantly about the kitchen. Steve’s face was still a bright, cherry red beneath his mop of blonde hair, and his blue eyes were looking anywhere but at Bucky, sprawled dazedly on the bare boards beneath him. Bucky, who expected the pain in his head to dull was perplexed as he found it ratcheting up, becoming almost unbearable as the music continued to soar out of time, Steve’s weight resting light as a load of laundry on top of him.

  

-

 

“You know, Barnes, we can take this pain away from you. We can make it like it never existed.”

 

The agent was crouched low between Bucky’s bound knees, his arms folded atop Bucky’s thighs, and he was looking carefully up into the soldier’s stricken face, trying to break through the man’s pall of misery. Under normal circumstances, Bucky would be fighting tooth and nail to get the agent to stop touching him, but right then, _Jesus_ , he just didn’t care. Resistance had lost its savour somehow, just as his whole world had become so much smaller. Nothing mattered now, least of all his own comfort. What was the importance of something so trivial, when there was no one left but himself to care?

 

“We can remake you so that Rogers never happened.” The agent continued, his words invading Bucky’s consciousness like a soft, insidious purr. Somewhere in the background, Dr. Jung was readying the equipment, filling the syringes with glistening, clinical blue. “We can save you from the destruction of your grief, make him disappear so that he’ll never hurt you again. Would you like that, _Schätzchen_?”  

 

Bucky would _not_ like that. _Absolutely not._ Why on earth would he want to forget about the only thing left in his pathetic excuse for an existence that had any intrinsic worth? If Steve was truly gone – and _God,_ Bucky’s heart wouldn’t stop breaking afresh every time he considered it – then he didn’t think he could handle losing whatever pieces of his friend that still clung on inside him. That was _all_ that remained of a lifetime, of an entire relationship built out of mutual trust, acceptance, of noble self-sacrifice and reckless endangerment. It was something that was far too precious to give up, even if it hurt, because the both of them had fought so Goddamn hard for it. It would be an insult to Steve to even consider it for a moment, for a single, solitary second. No, Bucky _wouldn’t_ -

 

The tip of a needle pierced the skin of Bucky’s neck, and the chair beneath him began to emit a low, ominous hum, sending the hair on Bucky’s body standing straight up on end. Bucky’s eyes went wide with abject terror, the feeling cutting sharp like a knife through his sorrow. A metallic halo, shining bright and stark and horrifying, was descending from the back of the chair, encircling his forehead and he didn’t _want_ this-

 

“Please, don’t-” Bucky managed to stutter in protest before the mouth guard was forced roughly between his lips by gloved fingers, choking him with the taste of plastic and leather. The point where the needle had breached his body burned like hellfire, and it was spreading, blue and vicious through his veins like ignited gasoline.

 

“We’re only trying to help you, soldier. Rogers was no good for you, you _know_ that…”

 

No, _no_ , he didn’t know it.

 

 _Please don’t do this, please don’t take him from me, please d-_  

 

-

 

_(1943)_

 

Being alone with Steve again shouldn’t have been this difficult for Bucky, but somehow it just didn’t feel right. Nothing was the same.

 

 _Steve wasn’t the same_.

 

They were in their tent, the great, green forest around them rustling with the sounds of the other POWs, some talking, some laughing, some just trying to sleep in the aftermath of their escape from the Hydra facility. They had a long, arduous march ahead of them to make it back to the SSR base over the Italian border, and this small scrap of relaxation was likely the last they’d get for several days. Yet even with this knowledge hanging over his head like the Sword of Damocles, Bucky simply couldn’t bring himself to unclench.

 

The man lying next to him in the darkness seemed to be having similar difficulties, constantly shifting his unnaturally large bulk over the uneven ground, huffing and bringing up the fresh smell of wet earth. Bucky wanted to gripe at him for taking up over half the space in the tiny tent, but the old, familiar banter wouldn’t come. It was like he didn’t know how Steve would react to being sassed anymore, because what if the serum had changed his sense of humour as well as his shape? There was a gnawing bitterness in that uncertainty, and the feeling was growing harder and harder to ignore with every passing second of hideous awkwardness.

 

“I thought I’d know what to say to you, when I saw you again.” Steve whispered eventually, making the smaller man jolt in surprise. “I guess I thought you’d just be happy to see me and we wouldn’t even talk about, you know, _me_.”

 

The sudden speech was jarring to Bucky; to hear the voice he knew the exact timbre of within his very bones and to see it coming out of a person that was so remarkably altered made him incredibly uneasy. Yet he had to persevere, didn’t he? This was everything that Steve had ever wanted come true like a bleedin’ heart miracle, and who was Bucky to ruin that? Still, he couldn’t seem to help himself, and he had to turn away when he spoke again, ashamed.

 

“I never thought I’d feel so small next to you. Is this how you always felt back in Brooklyn?”

 

Bucky hadn’t meant for the question to come out sounding so repulsively self-deprecating. He was grateful for the gloom afforded by the stretched canvas overhead, the shrouded moon beyond it, because he knew his face must be pinked with embarrassment. _He’d never wanted Steve to see him like this - weak._ Everything in him seemed suddenly dwarfed, little and mewling, and his body ached unpleasantly in the aftermath of Zola’s mistreatment, with the prolonged lack of food and spiritual sustenance, and with the gutting absence of that stubborn, scrawny kid with the clear eyes and smart mouth for whom he’d do just about anything.

 

Steve didn’t answer Bucky for a good long while, until Bucky got to wondering frantically if he ever would.

 

“Aw hell, Buck…”

 

With a deep, helpless sigh Steve shifted onto his side and slung a burly arm over Bucky’s middle, drawing him back against his front and tucking their legs tightly together. Bucky gulped, not able to breathe. Steve’s chest felt as broad and impenetrable as an advancing tank. It was like being enveloped on all sides by a solid wall of warmth, and all Bucky could smell was the rich leather of Steve’s bomber jacket and the oppressive tang of masculine sweat and living dirt. It wasn’t the way Steve used to smell, like carbolic soap, poorly washed clothes and turpentine from painting. Hugged close together like this, Bucky just couldn’t ignore the new firmness of Steve’s frame, how different it was to his old bird bones and soft edges. The both of them still reeked a little of black smoke, of singed skin and terror, but it was the solid press of unaccustomed muscle along his spine that had Bucky’s eyes watering.

 

 _No_ , he thought desperately, _he wouldn’t cry_.    

 

After all that Zola had done, it would not be _this_ that broke him.

 

“It’s strange being the one to hold you, Buck,” Steve murmured low against the shell of his ear, his breath hot on the back of Bucky’s neck. The cold tip of his pointed nose buried against Bucky’s hairline, scenting him, making Bucky shudder with something wholly primal. And Bucky recognised that, yeah, _that_ was familiar. “Though, _Jesus Buck_ , I never thought I’d get to touch you again. Never thought I’d get to kiss you.”

 

Steve settled his lips soft against Bucky’s throat, mouth rasping the unshaved curve of his jaw. The movement felt oddly chaste for all the obvious heat behind it, though Bucky still let spill a broken gasp, the colour in his cheeks rising higher despite his disquiet. _It was only natural; Steve’s proximity had always been deadly._ Heat was beginning to curl in his lower belly, right beneath where Steve’s large hand was resting, the palm warm and the thumb stroking at the fine hairs trailing up from the waist of Bucky’s cargo pants. He couldn’t deny that Steve’s enhanced physique was affecting him in ways that were all kinds of appealing after all the horror he’d been through. But still, he couldn’t stop from berating himself, because no matter how good Steve felt this all seemed like a horrible betrayal of the scrawny guy he’d grown up with in Brooklyn, fallen so head-over heels in love with, who he’d given up any hopes of seeing again in this lifetime. Being strapped down and tortured for days on end by a mad scientist tended to make you think maudlin things like that – but _lord above_ , did Bucky ever need some comfort…

 

“Will you kiss me, Buck?” Steve coaxed, his voice cut with that light edge of challenge, and hell, _that_ was familiar too. Steve’s large hand had moved to cup Bucky’s hip possessively, fingertips slipping just slightly under the waistband of his trousers, and it made Bucky want to squirm and press himself backwards in a way he _never_ had with Steve. _He didn’t play the dame._ But Steve’s mouth was close at his ear again, murmuring hotly, “I know I ain’t exactly what you expected to find, but you’re everything I’ve been needin’.”      

 

It was the most vulnerable Bucky had ever felt, when moments later he found himself crushed flat to the forest floor, Steve tilting his chin up with both hands circling his throat, pressing enough to make him gasp for breath, the man’s tongue heavy and demanding in his mouth. He hadn’t expected to like it so much, being held down by someone so much stronger and bigger than himself, panting and whimpering with overstimulation as Steve bit and tore at him, making him hurt in the brightest and best way possible.

 

But he supposed it was only fair really, Steve had been playing this part for years.  

 

-

 

Why did his mouth taste like plastic?

 

A moment ago he could’ve sworn it’d tasted of something different, something fond.

 

Bucky tried licking the backs of his teeth, but grimaced as his tongue met the resistance of the rubber guard. Well. _Huh..._ Maybe it didn’t really matter. There had to be a reason for the guard to be there. There was no point asking questions why, though- _Where had he been?_ He was sure he’d had a long, tiresome journey someplace, but _where_ had it taken him? Lord, he couldn’t think, couldn’t wade through the big, black space he was in. Then he realised that his eyes were closed, that the darkness must be voluntary and that maybe he should break it, but then _no_. He was too darn exhausted, and everything was floating, suspended, so maybe he should just float along as well? 

                                                   

“It may take a few more attempts to achieve full suppression of his recall, but I’m optimistic. The serum should prevent any irreparable damage to his cerebral cortex, though I’m not sure how much pain he’ll be in once it wears off. Shouldn’t be life threatening.”

 

Someone was talking through the comfort of the dark, far off and echoing like the sound of a bird’s wings battering against battened windows. It was a beautiful noise, Bucky thought languidly, roaming through the emptiness in his head. So good to hear something real, something grounding, something…

 

“Excellent, Dr. Jung. Truly, you’ve impressed me. The results aren’t perfect, but for a first attempt…”

 

“Yes, well. It shouldn’t take too long to achieve the right calibration of the equipment, then we’ll be able to achieve more than just a partial wipe. If he can take it, I’d recommend we continue the treatment on a daily basis until he’s ready to receive commands. Right now though we’ve got to focus on clearing out the clutter. According to these readings his memories are still numerous and erratic, firing at random.”

 

Commands? Could he possibly refuse anything anyone asked of him when he was like this, so pliant and generous and happy? He was soaring, ready to comply, ready to do whatever was needed to maintain this level of unbridled, unconcerned bliss.

 

“One more round, I think. He’s smiling.”

 

The peaceful darkness shattered in an instant of electrified clarity, like all of his limbs had suddenly remembered their own existence and clenched rebelliously with anger, lighting him up.

 

His eyes flew open. _What-_

 

Two figures moved into view within Bucky’s peripheral vision, seeming to consider him as he thrashed against bindings he’d thought were a distant dream. Overcome by the dizzying unfamiliarity of the great white room, the complexity of the machinery looming close on all sides, countless red skulls cavorting around him, all Bucky could do was scream himself into welcome forgetfulness – _calling out to someone who was lost, far, far away._

 

Between the crests of each shockwave he caught glimpses, flickers, of red, white and blue.

 

Then nothing.

 

He saw only stars.

 

-

 

_(1941)_

 

Bucky was back from basic, and he was pleased as punch to have finally swapped the fir tree cold of Wisconsin for the familiar city chill of Brooklyn. It wasn’t going to be much of a visit, as he’d only been given a three-day furlough and he’d spent most of the first day and night hitching rides. Still, it wasn’t all lost time, at least he was reporting to the army terminal down at the docks instead of heading back to Fort McCoy. He’d still have two full, glorious nights with Steve and that was peachy, just what the doctor ordered. He’d drop in to see his ma too, and the girls if they weren’t out gadding. Home cooked food, warm bodies, and soft words, that was all he wanted as he pounded the frozen streets to the old tenements, turning the collar of his woollen winter uniform up against the falling December snow.     

 

When he reached the building that held the three-storey walk up he looked for the light in their window, the bottom of his stomach fluttering like nobody’s business. And yes, there it was, shining like a beacon through the early morning gloom. It was barely 6 o’clock yet but Steve was awake, probably pottering about the tiny kitchen making breakfast, probably talking to himself because _shit_ , he went stir crazy when he was alone. His letters to Bucky at Fort McCoy had been full of those tell-tale ticks and mannerisms, the sort that told Bucky that Steve was getting real lonesome without him. Well there’d be no more of that, Bucky decided, not for the next 48 hours at any rate.    

 

Climbing the stairs wasn’t as arduous as usual, not with his newly trained calf muscles so used to running drills. Proceeding along the landing and reaching their front door, he was surprised to find his heart was in his mouth, and he self-consciously smoothed his hair flat beneath his peaked cap. It was like the sensation of going on a first date, but that was crazy. It was only Steve.

 

Not having his keys, Bucky raised a fist, hesitated, then knocked.

 

It took a long while for Steve to answer, so long that Bucky’s patience wore thin as onion paper. Even so, when he finally opened the door and peered owlishly out into the landing Bucky couldn’t be annoyed with him – not when he looked so gosh darn pathetic.

 

Bucky should have known when he was granted furlough in the dead of winter that this was bound to happen. Because of course, _of course_ , Steve Rogers would be sick as a dog when Bucky came home.  

 

“Aw, hell, _baby…_ ” Bucky moaned, ignoring how Steve’s eyes went wide with shock or how his fevered cheeks flushed redder. He stepped cleanly over the threshold, shut the door, and wrapped his strong arms tight around Steve’s sweat-soaked body, feeling the smaller man squawk with indignation and barely suppressed delight. Damn, he was bundled up in so many blankets it was like hugging an overstuffed pillow. Bucky nuzzled Steve’s damp forehead and sighed low and frustrated, “Baby, why you gotta be ill when I got leave, _why?_ ”

 

“Don’t call me _baby_ , Barnes, I plain hate it when you call me _baby_ …” Steve craned his neck back, wrapped his arms around Bucky’s uniformed shoulders and pretended to scowl. Bucky noted how pale and brittle he was looking, like poor man’s glass, and he gentled his burly hold. Steve was grinning pretty, even as he tried to contain a rising cough. “What the hell you doin’ here anyway, punk, you didn’t tell me you were coming home!”

 

“Well thanks for the nice reception, jerk! Wanted to surprise you…” Bucky smiled like a cad from beneath the peak of his army cap, hoping he looked as dashing as those soldier boys on the posters. “Wanted to surprise my _baby_ , Rogers. I know how anxious she’s been, waitin’ on me. I try an’ tell her it’s only training, but I’ll be damned if she’ll listen to me.”

 

Then he buried his cold nose against Steve’s flushed neck and just breathed him in, loving the way he continued to grumble and flail and stridently protest his masculinity. Even with all that talk, Steve struggled kittenishly in Bucky’s prolonged embrace, made weak by God knows what ailment. Still, he put up one helluva heroic fight as Bucky caught him deftly in a fireman’s lift and hefted him in the direction of the bedroom. There was a wheeze in his laugh and he was sporting a smirk that could stone the crows, and Bucky didn’t care for once if he hadn’t locked the door or closed the blinds, he kissed Steve like he didn’t care if anyone was watching. Because _good_ _lord_ , Bucky had missed this.

“Now Buck, just ’cause I’m glad to see you don’t mean you can take liberties with my virtue.”

 

“Virtue? Honey, you’re about as shiny as a brass tack.”

 

-

 

“Enough for today, I think. Wouldn’t be wise to push him too hard.”

 

Sonofabitch nodded his head to Dr. Jung who murmured in agreement. The technician was making copious notes on a clipboard. Together, they stepped back from examining Bucky’s limp, docile form, pleased with themselves and their handiwork.  

 

The Sergeant could barely lift his own head, and he didn’t even think of fighting as the guards advanced to release him from the chair’s restraints. Bucky’s mind was a rustling, confused jumble, and though he knew where he was, who he must be, there was something not quite right in him, something muffled and pressed flat, _missing_. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but he couldn’t concentrate on what it might mean either as he was hauled to his feet, groaning and staggering like the soles of his feet had been beaten. His stomach rolled, and he wondered vaguely if he was going to vomit on his own chest. _What- What had they-?_    

 

“You did well, Barnes. Very well.”

 

A hand descended on Bucky’s flesh shoulder, patting him conspiratorially. The plates of his metal arm whirred then settled in a low hum, as though they had enjoyed the contact. He was confused, wary of the unsolicited praise. The agent was smiling down at him kindly, his eyes flush with the greed of success.

 

“Same time tomorrow?”

 

Bucky just nodded stupidly, having absolutely no idea what he was supposed to be agreeing to or what on Earth they’d taken.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Schnell_ = Quick, an order to action (German)  
>  _Schätzchen_ = darling, affectionate (German)
> 
> [As usual, I have tried to use phrases from different languages for atmosphere. I apologise if I have used them incorrectly and welcome corrections!]


	5. Betraying Susi

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warnings for this chapter: non-consensual content, themes of hurt/comfort, and period-typical homophobia. 
> 
> Herein we learn more of Susi and Mischa's past, as well as Bucky's early relationship with Steve. Turns out, it was pretty lemony.

 

Bucky’s legs could barely hold him up as he was thrust unceremoniously back into the cell. The weight of the metal arm dragged him off to one side, disrupting his equilibrium so that he stumbled on the uneven cobbles, falling.

 

Susi’s hand shot out from the darkness to steady him, and he wondered through the haze of rapidly encroaching noise and light and _voices_ whether she was speaking to him, or if the words washing over him were the remnants of some horrible dream, of some other place, _of some featureless person he_ _couldn’t quite remember_. Colours swam in and out of his vision, and sharp, shooting pains ran from his jaw, up the bridge of his nose, behind his eyes, bursting in his temples like fireworks. It didn’t matter how many times he blinked, the barrage wouldn’t stop. Faces that he _thought_ he knew flickered up and away like cards in a rolodex, never staying quite long enough for him to grasp before they disappeared into the fog.

 

“Are you listening to me? You’ve been gone for hours, Sergeant, I thought-”

 

Bucky began to shiver violently, like he was frightened, but he didn’t know _why._ He just knew that he was being manhandled across the cell, and that he wasn’t making it easy with his leaden, seizing limbs, but there was a persistent disconnection occurring between his mind and his body that he simply couldn’t overcome. Whereas Hydra’s electric shock treatment usually made him hyper aware of every bone in his skeleton, this time it seemed to have created a cerebral distance in its aftermath, some sort of cavernous gap in his brain that he was struggling to close. It was maddening, this break with his routine. _It wasn’t supposed to be like this, what-_ On one side of his divided consciousness he could see himself floundering like a fish out of water, helpless with all motor functions impaired, while on the other he saw that he was whole and healthy, waiting to be summoned forward to act – but the message simply couldn’t get through, he couldn’t give the command. All words and phrases blurred into something unrecognisable.

 

The backs of his knees hit the edge of the cot, and Susi was forcing him to sit, leaning over him and pushing his sweaty hair back off his brow, pressing her wrist to his forehead to gauge his temperature, face pinched with deep concern.

 

“ _Boychick_ …” she murmured urgently. “ _Boychick_ , come on. You’re alright…”

 

Acting on a kind of sense memory as opposed to his own volition, his flesh hand came up to grip at her arm, squeezing hard, and suddenly, inexplicably, he was crying. The shame of his tears ripped hot and vivid through his chest, but he found that he couldn’t stop them, that he was gasping and sobbing and Susi was trying to hold him but he couldn’t let her distract him from a dawning realisation. _The chair._ He needed to tell her something important, something vital, because if he didn’t tell her now it would be lost. _Someone would disappear_.

 

It was someone he knew, perhaps someone he _loved_ , and Bucky strained with everything he had to keep hold of them through his confusion, even as they inched further and further away into bleak forgetfulness. _But no…_ They were two different people. _Yes…_ Short, scrappy and loud, blue eyes the kind you couldn’t look away from, a smile so winning in a face born to failure – beaten up in back alleys, given a wide berth in bars, looking up rueful but sunny at Bucky in the privacy of that three-storey walk up. _Then what…_ Those same eyes, that same smile, but the jaw was broader, the body taller, the press of their limbs heavier as they bore down on top of him – under canvas in the great, green forest, with the smell of the wet earth strong in his nose, pressing his cheek against a chest that had once rattled with asthma. _Then falling, losing his grip…_ Then the understanding, sharp and visceral in the cold and the snow, that things would never be the same again, that the two people were irreconcilable, yes, but that they had each changed him in their own way for the better. _But he would never see him again to tell him so…_ That Bucky was made better by them both he knew like he knew his catechism. He could remember that. He could remember _him._

 

“Steve.” Bucky spat the word through gritted teeth, his cheeks wet and overwarm under the hand Susi pressed there. “Steve Rogers. Steven Grant Rogers.”    

 

The thunderous void in Bucky’s mind yielded gradually as he repeated the name, as he pushed his face into Susi’s stomach and chanted it, fingers still vice-like upon her arm. The name brought a sort of happiness at first, but this was short lived. As he continued to say it over again, like he was praying the rosary, the name grew sadder, became hopeless and hollow. It was like coming to terms with something that was missing, recognising that something once integral to his sense of self had suddenly gone AWOL.   

 

“No, Steve… _Stevie…_ ”

 

And slowly he remembered what Hydra had wanted him to forget, what that ghastly chair had wanted him to lose. And he cried all the harder for the knowledge, because he knew again, sharply and instantaneously, why no one was coming for him.

 

People couldn’t come for you if they were dead.

 

They couldn’t come for you if you were forgotten.

 

_The Valkyrie... The ice... The great, gnawing blackness of being alone…_

 

The front of Susi’s dress was wet through by the time Bucky pulled back from her, endless minutes later. Though he wanted to apologise he found he couldn’t bring himself to utter the words. The comfort of her closeness forced him to hold his tongue, and when he finally let himself look up at her he was gratified to see that she wasn’t angry, only so desperately sorry for him.

 

“Better, Sergeant?” she asked cautiously, placing both hands on his shoulders and fixing him with a determined eye. He smiled weakly at that.

 

“No,” Bucky replied, his voice hoarse like he’d been screaming for days without relief. “Not better. I don’t-” His chest shuddered unexpectedly, like he was instinctively repressing a fresh volley of sobs because looking at her made him think of Steve, because Steve had been just as kind, just as gentle, but also just as tough around the edges. _Just as rutting stupid, getting himself killed, leaving Bucky behind._ “I don’t think I’ll get better, not after this.”

 

Susi drew her bottom lip between her teeth and bit down, her fingers tightening, like something in her baulked at his despondency. Steve’s stubbornness shone like a beacon from behind her eyes, bewitching him by proxy, but Bucky found he couldn’t fault her for it. It hurt like hell to be reminded right then, but still, he liked it. Steve had stared at Bucky like that so many countless times; whenever he’d opened his smart mouth in willful retort, whenever he’d drawn back a fist to make things square in a fight, _whenever he’d insisted that he loved Bucky whenever Bucky doubted it._

 

“What do you need from me, Sergeant?” Susi asked seriously, crouching down on the cobbles before him and grasping his knees. _What can I do for ya, Buck? Steve smiling crookedly, leaning against the frame of their bedroom door._ He looked down at her dully, loving her a little as he ached and bled inside as the recollections resurfaced thick and fast, stinging. “Please, Sergeant Barnes, just tell me what you need me to do?”

 

He wanted Steve, needed to tell him he was a no good punk, to wrestle him down, to overpower that glorious fight in him. _I’m with ya ’til the end of the line, pal._ But how could he confess that to Susi, when it was something she very likely wouldn’t want to hear? _Faygala_ , she’d say, disgusted. And she’d have a right to be. He’d been made so wrong, and he was finally paying the price for it. He’d be paying for it ’til the end of the world and beyond. There was no absolution for him anymore, not with the knowledge that Steve was dead planted in him like some bitter seed.

 

Sighing heavily, Bucky brought a hand up to cup the curve of Susi’s cheek. His heart called out to her heat, needing something to heal the big, empty gash in his chest now slowly filling up with snow. The sinking feeling in his gut seemed to mirror that sensation, a while ago, when he’d sailed through the winter air and watched the train speeding away above him, fast, and Steve’s anguished expression turning from faint to meaningless to nothing in the growing distance. Then there had been the crash of his body hitting the icy rocks, the biting, remorseless freezing of his limbs, the inexpressible need for someone warm to touch him, rescue him, reassure him that he wasn’t lost or dying. _Had Steve felt like that too at the end, out there in the desolate Arctic?_ Susi’s dark curls brushed against the backs of Bucky’s knuckles, his thumb glancing the edge of her mouth, and he felt a twinge of regretful want, but no fire left within him with which to stoke it to a burning, self-flagellating rage. _She was warm, alive…_

 

“Will you sit awhile with me, real quiet, just-” He said it apologetically even as he gripped the lapels of the sniper jacket and drew her closer. He rested his nose in her hair, closed his eyes and scented her. A harsh lump rose in his throat when he felt Susi stiffen in his hold, and he knew he’d go to Hell and be damned for what he wanted to say and do, but he thought if he didn’t indulge the inclination he might just _shatter_. “I ain’t gonna hurt you, I just need you to stay here quiet and still for a moment-”

 

His body was still trembling from the aftershocks of the electricity, from the sadness and rage and _loss_ , and he wondered if Susi felt the jolt of it as he kissed her forehead, then behind her ear, the spot beside her nose. That gentlemanly soldier boy growled low in his chest, and Steve’s disappointed face flashed from behind his eyes before Bucky opened them again. _But he’s not here is he? He’s gone._ Susi didn’t move under his scrutiny, but her rigidity was indecisive, her breath quick and frightened as the metal hand pressed at the back of her neck, as his flesh fingers mapped the contours of her face.

 

“Sergeant-”

 

Bucky caught her mouth deftly with his lips, swallowing his name on her tongue.  

 

As he sunk with relief against her, he knew he would never be able to forgive himself for such a wanton act of betrayal. It wasn’t just that he had broken his promise, it was that he could feel her confusion and fear rearing up against the press of his kiss, in the noises she made, soft and inconsolable as he forced himself on her. He let his flesh hand fall from her face to cover the fingers she had lifted to push at his bare chest, and it would have been _so easy_ to push back at her, to make her fall and spread out on the cobbled floor, to settle down on top of her and forget _everything_. The wrongness of the desire fought hard against the heady draw of the rich, human taste of her, against the fact that touching her was like touching someone else, someone _so important_ but whom he would never see again.

 

_You got a lot o’ nerve, Buck, bringing me into this._

 

Bucky winced, gasping brokenly against Susi’s unwilling mouth.

 

_No._

 

Sure, it was loneliness and unbridled grief that had made him do it, but it was self-disgust that made him stop.  

 

He drew back from her like he’d been slapped, though Susi hadn’t raised a hand to strike him. She remained exactly where he’d left her, frozen, face upturned to his and breathing made shallow with barely suppressed anger. Her nails were digging hard into the muscle beneath his collarbone, and he realised that he was still gripping her wrist, forcing her hand to remain pressed against his skin. Releasing her at once he tried to speak, but no words came.

 

There was no justification for what he had done to her, only remorse.

 

-

 

 _My first kiss was like this_ , Susi thought abstractedly, mind made dim by shock as she stared up into Bucky’s face, hardly registering the repentance in his eyes as she began to panic. She felt trapped suddenly, skittish, vulnerable in this inescapable cell with this _man_ leaning over her. _Would he really...?_ Bucky’s actions had stirred bad memories in her, bringing up snapshots of her life before, in the ghetto, with the soldiers.

 

Susi swallowed, hard.  

 

When the family had entered the ghetto in the summer of 1941, Susi’s mother had told her to cover her curled hair with a scarf, tied tight below the chin. She made Susi wear one of her father’s old coats whenever she left the apartment, no matter the weather. The mannish cut of it was baggy enough to obscure her blooming figure, the collar stiff enough to be turned up, hiding the rose of her cheeks and the fullness of her lips. It was well meant, this feeble attempt at protection, but ultimately it had made little difference.

 

It had been harsh, _that first kiss_ , her lips salted with the wash of tears on her cheeks, and it had hurt more than she expected to be held so firm and so close against someone so much stronger, bigger, more powerful than herself in every possible way.

 

Her body had felt different in the aftermath. Violated, yes, but somehow not her own.

 

She’d lain sleepless in the wake of it, night after endless night, wondering at the mystery of the other sex. That the Germans wanted her, when she represented everything that was abhorrent to their very way of life, was a fact that unsettled her more than their aggressive persistence, more than the press of their uniforms against her skin.

 

She almost hyperventilated every time she stepped out into the street, made anxious not only by the threat of assault but because she simply couldn’t understand the motive behind it. She felt irreparably strange, unclean, an oddity under constant watch within a community of people she’d once called friends. No one wanted to talk to her anymore. Her mother could barely look at her, though she tried so hard to be normal.

 

Each time it got worse.

 

Each time she felt herself being chipped away at, altered.

 

Mischa had been the only man Susi knew not to call her a Nazi’s _nafka_ , and she’d wanted to marry him out of sheer, immoderate gratitude. He never pushed her to love him. He just stayed close and calm beside her as the days dragged, only ever asking if he could hold her hand, maybe walk her home from the loading docks. The few times Mischa had kissed her, he had put his large hands beneath the mannish cut of her coat and stroked his thumbs comfortingly along her waist, telling her without words that the soldiers didn’t matter, that the only one who mattered was _her._ He’d always been gentle with her, his hold surprisingly subdued for someone of such an impressive bulk. Mischa was a good, understanding man, who brought bread for her mother and hovered in Susi’s purview like a rough, burly sentinel, ready to do whatever she needed of him at a moment's notice. Sure, he could never save her when _they_ came, not in that base, physical way, but afterwards he could always make her feel like herself again, just by smiling at her.

 

It was the same smile he’d worn the first time he’d seen her, on that blustery autumn morning in 1937. She was just a child then, buying vegetables at his father’s store. He’d complimented her dress, asked about her day, filled her basket and grinned soft and sweet as he’d handed over her change. Every time Susi saw that smile on Mischa’s face she felt instantly young again, whole in a way she hadn’t felt since before the war.   

 

Peering blankly up at Bucky, Susi wondered whether the Sergeant’s smile had ever been as soft or as sweet as Mischa’s, or if he had always smiled so hollow. She wondered whether she could ever forgive him. Dropping her eyes from his, she concentrated on her hands balled tight in her lap, thinking.

 

Bucky wasn’t forcing her to cleave to him anymore, wasn’t trying to pen her in with his superior grip, but she still felt frozen to the bone under his relentless, agonised stare. He wasn’t speaking a word to her, but she heard him call her _liebling_ , darling. He wasn’t touching her anymore, but she could feel him everywhere. She felt _them_.

 

Yet Susi found she couldn’t hate Bucky - not for this.

 

She had hated so fully and so many times before, and she’d hated men who had done much worse and who’d _liked it_. Bucky was sorry-looking, frightened and hurt, and while his mouth had burned it’d been a gentle kind of ache. The sure knowledge that he hadn’t _meant_ to override her crept slow and persistent from the corners of her brain, pricking at her conscience. She had to admit that she couldn’t mete out her hate for someone like him, someone just as helpless and as lost as herself, even with the taste of his offense still fresh on her lips. She understood implicitly that he had needed something, that it hadn’t really been _her_ who he’d wanted to kiss.

 

Her stilted breathing became a touch easier as she let that realisation settle in, and soon she was pressing her hand over Bucky’s knee, squeezing in a gesture of comfort. His fingers were quick to cover her own, his grasp disbelieving but relieved.

 

Mischa would have smiled at her then, told her that she was brave. He had deserved so much better than the end he’d been given, but life, at least for _them_ , was turning out far from fair.

 

“It’s alright, _boychick_. You’re alright...” Susi said after a moment of indecision, trying to muster a reassuring tone. She steadfastly ignored the stinging behind her eyes, choosing instead to focus on the lick of hope that had flared across Bucky’s worn face at her words. She patted his knee, quick and conspiratorial as she murmured, “I’m alright.”

  

-

 

_(1936)_

 

“Rogers, I sure wish you’d quit this…” Bucky groaned out low and resentful, trudging along behind Steve with his hands dug deep in his winter coat. He sighed when he got no reply from the skinny blonde in front of him, and his temper flickered from mildly irritated to downright _pissed off_. “Stevie, c’mon, you’re acting like an uppity mare!”

 

Steve didn’t even flinch, but his footsteps came faster and louder as he continued down the sidewalk at a quick pace. Such an insult would usually have gotten him grousing, spinning on his heel to press an accusatory finger into Bucky’s face. Not this time. Whatever fight they were about to have it seemed Steve wanted to keep a lid on it until they reached the privacy of their own three-storey walk up. Bucky sighed again, exasperated by his friend’s obstinacy and the lingering buzz of beer in his system.

 

“So that’s it, you just ain’t gonna talk to me? You gonna sulk like a Goddamn child?”

 

The night air of Brooklyn was dicey cold about them, to the point where Bucky knew it must be aggravating Steve’s lungs, but the other man just kept striding ahead, breathing laboriously yet hardly glancing back to acknowledge Bucky’s presence. It was just the two of them out on the street, all the lights in the surrounding shops turned down low. Dulled, convivial sounds hung heavy in the background as they passed several pubs, the smell of bourbon and cigarette smoke trailing after them as they headed into the residential district. Someplace far away they could hear the eerie, scratching whine of a gramophone blaring opera music from the open window of a tenement building, the noise cutting peculiar and high-pitched across the city quiet. Aside from these soaring, muted voices, they were completely, blissfully alone.

 

Steve didn’t seem overly concerned by their solitude, only the dark shade of pink creeping up the back of his neck betraying the fact that he was in any sort of discomfort. Bucky glared at that reddening patch of skin, flushing uncomfortably between the starched white of Steve’s shirt collar and the sandy hair at his nape. It drove Bucky to distraction, this cold shoulder routine, especially on an evening that had started out so well, with the usual dares, ribbing and casual drink, with Steve smiling pretty at him under the cover of nipping a slug of beer.

 

_So what if he’d been a bit of a flirt? A man was allowed to be._

 

Bucky’d been sure, deep down, that they’d learned to get past this nonsense. They each knew where the other stood in this mockery, and as far as Steve was concerned it wasn’t _together_. Speaking for himself, Bucky’d certainly had enough tiptoeing around for a lifetime.

 

“Rogers, c’mon-”

 

Bucky quickened his step until he drew level with his friend, bringing a hand down hard to cradle Steve’s crown, ruffling fondly at his hair. The somewhat rough touch was meant to be jocular, to break the ice a little, but Steve baulked. Shaking Bucky off he hocked at his feet, snarling like a rabid animal. The spit froze as it struck the pavement, and that instinctual worry in Bucky itched itself awake through the confusing mug of alcohol, his fingers groping to do up the buttons on Steve’s pitiful jacket. Resisting, Steve knocked him back and Bucky went, despite the fact that Steve’s punches never hit that hard.

 

“Keep your damn hands off me, Buck, or I swear to God-”

 

“Hey now!” Bucky held up both hands between them and leant further out of Steve’s space, surprised by the hot venom evident in his friend’s voice. “What the hell, Stevie, _Jesus_ -”  

 

“Don’t call me that, Buck, you ain’t got no right!”

 

Steve wasn’t walking ahead anymore, but standing his ground on his too-flat feet, looking small, scrappy and tired in that old jacket that never did fit. Everything always looked so gosh darn _big_ on Steve, Bucky thought, lingering as close to his friend as he dared. Grimly, he began preparing himself for an earful, recognising the type of anger burning blue in Steve’s eyes. It was the sort that never boded well.

 

_This damn thing again. Repeatin’ like the horses on the Coney Island carousel._

 

Bucky knew what he’d done back at the dancehall was all kinds of wrong. He knew he probably deserved everything Steve wanted to throw at him, but _hell_ was he ever sick of this charade. Every time it was the same argument, like a broken record skipping offbeat.

 

Plunging his hands back into the pockets of his slacks, Bucky tilted his head sideways and stared Steve down in outright defiance. When he spoke it was cocksure and lilting, the tone of a class troublemaker caught with his hand in the biscuit jar.

 

“You know Stevie, it’s always you says I should chase skirt when we go out swinging. Always you insistin’ we never sit at a table alone, that we invite over gals and entertain them so no one suspects. I was just tryin’ to keep things _normal_ for you.” Bucky rolled his shoulders in a slow, artless shrug, shaking his head helplessly. Steve just glared at him, his mouth hanging open like he wanted to retort but couldn’t find the right words. Bucky bit his lower lip slyly, trying to convey an attitude of aloofness as his heart pounded fit to burst in his chest. It wasn’t really like him to prod at Steve like this, but he suddenly felt completely justified in being a vindictive sonofabitch. He didn’t hide his sorry smile as he murmured, “It’s always you who's sayin’ you don’t wanna be treated like my Goddamn wife.”      

 

Steve couldn’t speak, though he wanted to tell Bucky _exactly_ what he thought of him. Hell, he wanted to drive his fist so far down Bucky’s throat that he’d punch his stomach raw, bring up the beer that was making him talk so cheap. He’d dearly love to wrap his fingers tight in Bucky’s hair and pull him down from that lofty height of overconfidence, own his mouth like Bucky owned just about everything else. But most of all, he wanted to get rid of the film reel playing over at the back of his mind, the one that showed Bucky dancing close with a beautiful girl, all swirling skirts, olive skin, and red high heels. No matter how hard Steve tried to push the image down, he couldn’t stop himself from drifting back to that awful shock, half an hour ago, when he’d found Bucky kissing the girl all fierce and longing in the alley behind the hall, his skilled hands rubbing rhythmically between her legs as she’d gasped desperately against his broad chest. He didn’t wanna think about how he’d heard Bucky call her _baby_ , lips flush at her temple as she’d shuddered to a breathy climax in his hold.

 

“You know Buck,” Steve said eventually, training his eyes on a point above Bucky’s left shoulder. He examined the brickwork on the building behind them, knowing that he wouldn’t be able to keep his nerve if he let himself meet Bucky’s spiteful, smirking gaze. He may have been small, nothing much to look at with his baggy clothes and his peaky skin, but Steve had dignity enough to respect his worth. He went on with a roughened tongue, wanting his inhaler as his lungs battled against his mounting anxiety and the frigid chill of the night. “There’s stupid in this world, sure, but then there’s _you_. Guess there’s only one sort of _gorgeous_ for you, and that’s the kind you can fuck and never be seen to care about.”      

 

A pause, then Bucky was giving a low chuckle that sounded all wrong with the strain of keeping himself calm.

 

“Oh I see, you reckon I don’t care? You reckon I only take _advantage_ when I’m lonesome, that it?”

 

When Steve gave a curt nod, Bucky advanced towards him in an instant, reaching up to grasp the smaller man by the shoulders. Steve wrinkled his nose, smelling the girl’s sweet perfume as well as her earthy, primal stink clinging to the cloth of Bucky’s suit. The sidewalk didn’t feel so chill anymore, and he flushed to the tips of his ears, embarrassed by their proximity. The smell of sex intensified as Bucky lifted a finger, chucking Steve beneath the chin, rubbing a calloused thumb along the indent below Steve’s bottom lip. The pads of his fingers were stained with waxy lipstick, marking Steve’s cheek and throat with blotches of scarlet. Bucky was leaning far too close to him, his expression intent, and Steve’s blood pounded hot and cold by turns at the thought of being arrested in the public street for gross indecency.

 

 _Sarah Rogers would turn over in her grave._  

 

“How about this,” Bucky said, pitching his words low even though he was sure the street about them was deserted. “I’ll show you just how much I care as long and as often as you want, pal, but quit pretending we’re something we’re not. Don’t take me out and push me on a girl because you’re frightened of yourself, then start crying because I go ahead and do something about it. You’ve never even said you _want_ me, Rogers, you just take what you _need_ when you need it and you don’t say a word on it afterwards. I don’t ever complain about being your dirty little squeeze, pal, but seriously-”  

 

Goaded, Steve wrenched his face back from Bucky’s grip and shook his head in disbelief, wounded but just as determined as ever to keep bringing the fight. Still, he had enough sense to be discrete in the wake of Bucky’s tipsy hotheadedness. Looking off to the side he saw that they were stood at the mouth of a darkened alleyway. Not perfect, but certainly serviceable. They were only a few blocks from their tenement, but Steve wasn’t sure he could wait even a minute to continue their row. _Jesus_ , there were so many things he wanted to say, so many ways in which he was hurting.

 

Flipping the collar of his jacket up decisively, Steve signalled for Bucky to follow him inside the alleyway. When Bucky merely rolled his eyes to the midnight sky, refusing to budge, Steve began muttering expletives, pinching the bridge of his nose in exasperation. He’d had enough of these games.   

 

“You follow me right now, James Buchanan Barnes, or I’ll tell your ma about that little tryst I saw.”

 

“Jesus Christ, _Stevie_ …”

 

“I ain’t lyin’, homewrecker. Don’t get your ass in here and you’ll only have yourself to blame.”     

 

Once safely ensconced within the gloom and shadow of the garbage cans, it was all Steve could do not to sink into his regular sparring stance. The muscle memory of so many back-alley beatings was difficult to shake, especially when Bucky’s hand descended on the side of his neck through the dark, blunt fingernails digging into his flesh, thumb stroking his adam's apple.

 

“No, Buck,” Steve hissed, batting him away in frustration. “I don’t want you pawing at me, not when you still reek of that _b_ -”

 

“Careful Stevie,” Bucky warned, a chivalric edge to his voice. “You never used to swear so easy, ’specially not about a lady.”

 

“And I never used to be at the end of my Goddamn wits neither, yet here I am!” Steve retorted sharply, folding his arms across his chest and casting his gaze to the litter strewn ground beneath his feet. The sight of it made him feel seedy, made him think about the girl pressed against the alley wall under Bucky’s weight, and he swayed a little, fighting down a sudden tide of impotent nausea. Bucky reached out for him again, concerned, but Steve wouldn’t have it. “I said not to touch me and I meant it. Touch me again Barnes and I’ll break your fingers.”

 

“Stevie, _baby_ , c’mon-”   

 

“I ain’t your baby,” Steve stated hoarsely, glad for the shadows obscuring his wrecked expression, hiding the tremors currently running riot in him from barely suppressed rage. Now that they were out of the open Steve felt safe enough to unclench a bit, to give vent to the sensation of bitter betrayal shredding his insides. He didn’t know if what he was experiencing could even be called anger anymore, he just knew it stung worse than anything he had ever felt. Bucky lifted a repentant hand to him once more, tried to cup his cheek in consolation, but again Steve knocked it back. “ _No_ , Buck. I mean it. I ain’t your baby. I ain’t _yours_ , least of all when I see you rutting with total strangers right in front of me, I ain’t-”    

 

“I didn’t think you’d care, Rogers, really I-”

 

“Like I said,” Steve snorted derisively, cutting across him. “There’s stupid, and then there’s _you_. You must have the thickest skull on the entire planet Buck, to think I wouldn’t care!”

 

“You’re not being fair, Stevie, you’ve never _said_ -”

 

“When have we ever needed to _say_ anything, Buck, for God’s sake!”

 

Steve had shouted out without meaning to, and in the ringing silence that followed he pressed his hand to his mouth in horror. He was never one prone to self-pity or reckless disregard, but sometimes, when he was pushed too far, he simply couldn’t help it. His guard slipped. Seeing Bucky taking that girl, fingers disappearing into her while the music from the dancehall covered their lascivious moans, that had pushed Steve further than he ever thought he could go.

 

“You… You sayin’ you want me?” Bucky asked haltingly, not daring to believe the proof of his own ears. Steve didn’t reply, just watched the other man carefully, chest heaving like he was about to pitch a fit. Bucky pressed further, feeling dangerous with sudden elation. “And I mean for more than just the odd tumble, Rogers, I mean _really_ want me? ’Cause hell, if I thought you wanted me like that I’d do just about anything to make you happy.”

 

“I’ve told you before... I’m not… I ain’t gonna be your kept woman, Buck, I _can’t_ -” Steve began to protest, feeling trapped by his own irrepressible sense of inadequacy, but Bucky shook his head in earnest dismissal.  

 

“I don’t mean it like that, Steve.” Bucky sighed hopelessly, not knowing how to phrase what he meant without causing Steve offence. Talking this way was like walking on eggshells, Steve always finding an excuse to push Bucky back, mar his good intentions with insecurity. How could Bucky explain the urge he felt to protect Steve, to keep him close and sheltered and adored, without belittling him or wounding his pride? And the girl? _Well._ How could he apologise for breaking a trust they’d never even spoken of? Licking his lips thoughtfully, he tried again. “Wanting to take care of you like I do, wanting to be yours ’til I die, that don’t make you any less of a man, Stevie. Just means you’re more than special to me...”

 

“You’re always callin’ me gorgeous…” Steve muttered resentfully, the colour high in his cheeks with this uncomfortable display of honesty. They were getting to the heart of it now, sure enough, the root of all their problems. “It’s like you see me as just another dame. Well I’m _not_ , you got that? I don’t want you to see me like you saw that girl, Buck, I don’t want you to treat me that way.”

 

“Yeah?”

 

Taking a chance, Bucky purposefully crowded Steve back against the alley wall, lifting a hand to brush his knuckles across Steve’s rising blush. Steve let him do it, only flinching a mite in instinctual irritation.

 

“Well I don’t want you to treat me - _us_ \- like a secret no more, like what we’re doing is filthy. We might need to keep it private from the rest of the world - Hell, that’s just good sense - but not between ourselves, ya hear?”

 

Bucky levelled a meaningful glare at the smaller man to quell any retort, before pushing his other hand beneath Steve’s jacket and settling it at the base of his spine. He stroked at the starched fabric of Steve’s shirt, noting the quiver it elicited and the furtive, near-missable tilt of Steve’s chin downwards, his embarrassed whine. Bucky sighed in exasperation, but refused to loosen his grip. Squirming and huffing in discomfort, Steve frowned as Bucky continued to talk, letting the words fall hushed against the worried creases of his forehead.

 

“All I want is for you to get over this fucking inferiority complex you have and realise that loving me doesn’t make you some starry-eyed woman in a picture show.”

 

Bucky smiled almost wistfully as Steve flashed him a reproachful glare. He’d always admired that glorious fight in Steve, even when it was bent fulltilt in his direction. He nearly wanted to laugh, the backs of his knuckles continuing to rasp against the perpetually defiant curve of Steve’s jaw.   

 

“ _Christ_ , if you can reconcile yourself to all that I won’t keep looking for comfort elsewhere. I’ll take it from where I’ve always wanted it...”    

 

“You call what you did to that girl taking _comfort_?” Steve asked with a sneer, incredulous.

 

“It was…” Bucky paused, wanting to choose his next words with exceeding care. He could sense that it was one of those pivotal moments in a relationship when only the truth would do - he just didn’t know if Steve could handle it. Taking a shuddering breath, he confessed shamefacedly, “I’m not gonna lie to you, Stevie. It was nice having someone lust after me, knowing they weren’t trying to hide it. I couldn’t tell you her name, but I know she didn’t feel half the shame you seem to feel whenever you touch me. I mean, you won’t even _speak_ to me when you slip into my bed, you just...”

 

It was Bucky’s turn to blush and he stopped talking abruptly, tongue-tied and suddenly short on his trademark swagger.  

 

“I guess there’s some sense in that,” Steve conceded slowly after several moments of silence, though he continued to scowl up at the taller man. The hurt was obviously still raw in him, even if the awkward truth behind Bucky’s words couldn’t easily be denied. “You know you’re not off the hook though, right?” Steve growled confrontationally, leaning a fraction into Bucky’s embrace yet maintaining that expression of steely aggression. Wonderfully familiar in an unfamiliar expanse, Bucky recognised it as Steve’s warface. “I don’t forgive that easy.”

 

“Yeah, well,” Bucky rolled his shoulders in an insolent shrug, pushing his tongue into the side of his cheek as he began to grin. “Neither do I.”  

 

Lips crashing together, they were like two bulls locking horns when they finally kissed, each trying fiercely to dominate the other. Bucky didn’t insult Steve by letting him win, but it still felt like his victory when Steve forced him to his knees, grazing his thumb possessively along the edge of Bucky’s mouth. His blue eyes blazed harsh in his thin face and he panted, almost grinning as he watched Bucky contemplate his crotch, head cocked to one side. Moving reflexively to grasp Steve’s belt Bucky paused, feeling the hardness beneath the metal clasp and sighing deep in his chest, steadying himself. There remained that flicker of anxiety, still, that flash of uncertainty in his gut. Looking up at the smaller man above him, he raised a questioning eyebrow.

 

“Is this wanting or needing, Stevie, I gotta know.”

 

“Wanting. Always _wanting_ , Buck.” Steve admitted softly, and for once he didn’t glance away with the unease that was so characteristic of him. He stared Bucky full in the face as he carded a hand through Bucky’s hair, tugging on it fondly. “Don’t want your mouth on anyone else but me. Truth is I don’t think I can stand it…”   

 

“All I needed to hear, pal.” Bucky leant forward as he undid Steve’s belt buckle, pressing his face against the warm skin of Steve’s stomach and nipping it, feeling a heady mixture of reverence and relief. He licked and kissed at the trail of fine hair leading down into Steve’s underwear, and he nuzzled his nose affectionately against the worn fabric, breathing in the damp, masculine scent. The grip in his hair tightened as Steve choked out a gasp in response, making Bucky smirk in triumph. “Use me however you like, baby, I ain’t the boss of you…”    

 

“ _Jesus_ , Buck…”  

-

 

“Sergeant?”

 

Susi’s hand was cupping Bucky’s flesh shoulder, shaking him roughly to consciousness.

 

“What-”

 

Bucky blinked.

 

There was a bowl of broth hovering in the air in front of him. He stared at it uncomprehendingly for a while, his mind a whirling sea of nothingness. This wasn’t right. _He had been somewhere pleasant, somewhere dark and warm and full of bittersweetness. Red lipstick smudged across pale, sickly skin. This wasn’t-_ Susi was tilting the rim of the bowl against his lips coaxingly, wanting him to drink. Bucky licked at the contents tentatively, the broth proving salty and surprisingly hot. Through his confusion he sighed, contented. It tasted like mana. Frowning, he tried to remember how to swallow.

 

“They brought us food while you were sleeping,” Susi was explaining quietly, not looking directly at him as she held the bowl steady for him. “I thought it best to wake you before it got cold. You need to keep up your strength, soldier.”

 

Gulping weakly at the proffered food, Bucky’s brain began to unfog just enough for him to focus his attention fully upon her. She was crouched low on the cobbled floor beside him, knees tucked in and tight together, making a concerted effort not to touch him now that he was sufficiently roused. Noting her careful demeanor, the grim set of her mouth, and suddenly remembering the _cause_ , Bucky’s stomach rolled violently and he pushed the broth away. He felt sickened.

 

“Susi,” he spluttered, horrified. “Darlin’, how can I-”

 

“You weren’t yourself,” Susi interrupted him sharply, her voice firm. “I understand. Don’t trouble yourself over it.”

 

Making to protest, to offer further apology, Bucky found himself checked by a raised hand.

 

Susi was watching him closely, her expression one of frank determination and maybe a little kindness. There was calculation there too, Bucky noticed, the realisation causing his skin to prickle all over with unease. Susi looked as though she were deliberating, like she’d glimpsed something peculiar and needed to examine it more minutely before believing the truth of it. Setting the bowl of broth on the ground beside them, she eased herself forward a little, palms up in a gesture of commiseration Bucky found difficult to comprehend given what he had done. The edges of her plush mouth twitched, and she raised her eyebrows challengingly when he tried to speak again. He fell silent obediently, uncertain of her motive.

 

“You were overwrought, not thinking clearly.” Susi continued evenly, her dark gaze trained on him like a hawk feeling out the movements of a timid field mouse. “You needed something to help you with the pain.”

 

Bucky felt pinned beneath her unapologetic scrutiny, bare in a way that was completely justified given his earlier betrayal of her trust. _Lord_ , if he had ever felt more ashamed in his entire life he couldn’t recall it. What confused him though, was how calmly she was speaking to him, how little ire inflected her tone.

 

“Pain?” Bucky murmured blankly, feeling a distant, dawning sense of dread tugging at the back of his scorched brain.

 

 _No,_ he thought, _she can’t-_

 

“It’s difficult, I know, losing someone dear to you.” Susi said, her slow, measured words sounding almost tender. “It’s only natural to want comfort in grief, when someone you love is taken from you.”

 

Susi inclined her head slightly to one side, not letting Bucky look away from her gentle, probing inquisition. While he’d been lying unconscious on the cell floor, she’d been dwelling on the name he’d called out, how the sound of it had reverberated so small and broken before he’d succumbed to kissing her. _Steve. Steve Rogers. Steven Grant Rogers. Stevie._ Bucky stared back at Susi like a deer caught in headlights, stunned. Icy apprehension was creeping insidiously within his gut, but Susi’s eyes were soft, not judging.

 

“Am I right, _boychick_?”

 

It was like a bomb had dropped in Bucky’s mind, obliterating all sense of caution. He was nodding frantically before he could stop himself, before he could even contemplate the prospect of lying to her. Bucky’s ears had filled up, producing nothing but comforting, crackling, white noise, and it was like he wasn’t even present inside his own head as he found himself saying thickly, “They killed him and now they’re trying to take him away from me. They- They want to make me forget, but I- I can’t, I _can’t_ -”

 

Susi’s arms were around him in an instant, her womanly warmth enveloping him tightly from all sides, and she was shushing him, stroking his hair, trying to tell him that it was alright. He began to cry in short, painful bursts, the unrelenting volley making it difficult to breathe as he buried his face in her sternum.

 

“They took him. He’s gone. Susi, darlin’, he’s _gone_ and, and I- I won’t ever be able to tell him-”

 

Bucky ranted and choked over his words nonsensically, clutching at the back of the borrowed sniper jacket with all the strength of a drowning man. Susi was forced to bend further over him, but she let him drag her down even as she winced. The knuckles of his flesh hand turned white in the night time blue of the fabric, near ripping it, while his metal fingers scrabbled uselessly at Susi’s side, refusing to obey his commands. He should have felt relief at her acceptance, the forgiving tenderness of her hold on him, but instead he found that he had never felt more completely alone.

 

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry for what I-” Bucky hiccuped desperately into the soft curve of Susi’s neck, her brown curls brushing his wet cheeks. “I’m so sorry, baby, I’m sorry, I’m _sorry_ -”

 

What made the whole thing so much harder for him to bear was the slow realisation that he didn’t know if he was speaking to her or to _him_ , to _Steve_. The two of them had become somehow indivisible within Bucky’s scattered thoughts, a fact that only added to his torment as Susi began rocking him back and forth, never flinching as Bucky proceeded to sob his heart clean out against her shoulder.  

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -
> 
>  _nafka_ = whore (Yiddish)  
>  _boychick_ = An affectionate term for a young boy. (Yiddish)  
>  _Faygala_ = a homosexual (Yiddish)  
>  _liebling_ = darling (German)
> 
> [As usual, I have tried to use phrases from different languages for atmosphere. I apologise if I have used them incorrectly and welcome corrections!]


End file.
